HFE 



OF 




C/ ^ 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI, 



OF 



BRESCIA: 



FOUNDRESS OF THE ORDER OF SAINT URSULA. 



. _^ 

BY THE ABBE PARENTY, 
CANON OP ARRAS, MEMBER OF THE SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES OF LA MORINIE. 



"WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THE ORDER IN IRELAND, 
CANADA AND THE UNITED STATES, 

V' JOHN GILMARY SHEA. 



PUBLISHED WITH THE APPROBATION OP THE 
RT. REV. BISHOP OF PHILADELPHIA. 



•^^- 



PETER F. CUNNINGHAM, CATHOLIC BOOKSELLER, 

216 SOUTH THIRD STREET. 

185 8. 






Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the 
year 1857, by 

PETER F. CUNNINGHAM, 

In the Office of the Clerk of the District Court of the 
Eastern District of Pennsylvania. 



8, Douglas Wybth, Agt., Stbbb >typbb. 
Ko 7 Pear Street, PMla. 



/ n/^ I 

PREEACE. 

The reading of the lives of the Saints has been 
at all times recommended by the Church. God, in 
fact, raised them up to bring back to him, by the 
spectacle of their example and miracles, the nations 
among which they lived. In permitting public 
honors to be paid to them, the Holy Ghost, who 
directs the Church, has wished their virtues to be 
thus perpetuated in the memory of men. Hence 
the numerous panegyrics of our Christian orators : 
hence, too, the immense labors undertaken by the 
learned of every age to elucidate and recount their 
- onderful works. 
Some among them have shone with a brighter 
i;ht, like the stars of heaven, whom the Supreme 
aler of all things had set differently in the vast 
expanse of the firmament. Angela Merici, whose 
life we write, was evidently raised up by God to 
serve as a light to her age, to revive faith, then 
almost extinct, and to found an order of virgins, 
till then unknown in the Church. This institute, 
whose origin dates from the revival of learning in , 
Europe, has spread with astonishing success, and 
diffused Catholic doctrines at a time when a strug- 
gle was going on between the religious parties that 

divided whole kingdoms. 

• • • 
111 



IV PREFACE. 



The order of Ursulines, founded by Saint Angela, 
has fulfilled this mission with ever increasing happi- 
ness, especially in France, till the period of the 
unhappy Revolution in that country. Then the 
many monasteries that had been created in its pro- 
vinces were suppressed ; but scarcely was religion 
restored to the soil of France, when new communi- 
ties arose in almost every diocese. In ISOT, Pope 
Pius VII. canonized the Blessed Angela Merici: 
this was an encouragement for the Ursulines who 
had survived the revolution. Aided by the bishops, 
and even by the civil authorities, they formed new 
establishments for the instruction of youth. A few 
years sufficed to restore more than a hundred com- 
munities, now very flourishing. 

A complete life of Saint Angela was needed 
among them, and we have undertaken this. The 
authors that have aided us in its composition, all 
bear the approbation of the ecclesiastical authority. 
The chief are : — Father Quarre, of the Oratory ; a 
life inserted in the History of the Order of Saint 
Ursula, printed at Paris in 1516, in two volumes 
4to ; a short life issued at Rome in 1^Y8, and a 
nearly complete life published at Fougeres in 183T. 
We have besides consulted Alban Butler, the 
Journal of the illustrious nuns of the Order of Saint 
Ursula, and the brief of her canonization. 



CONTENTS. 

BOOK I. — CHAPTER I. 

Birth of Saint Angela — Her precocious love of 
retirement— Her austere life — ^Parents' death. 9 

CHAPTER n. 
Angela and her sister at their uncle's — They 
retire to a hermitage — Their taste for soli- 
tude — Death of her Sister — Miraculous ap- 
parition-Angela makes her first communion. 11 

CHAPTER in. 

Saint Angela enters the Third Order of Saint 
Francis — Her austerities — Her temptations 
— Death of her uncle, Biancozi — She forms a 
community of Sisters of the Third Order, at 
Desenzano — Resolves to devote herself to 
the education of youth. - - - - 25 
CHAPTER rv. 

Apparition of the mysterious ladder — God re- 
veals his design in her regard — Efforts of 
Angela's zeal at Desenzano — Her trials — 
The Pentegoli family — Her projected house. 36 

BOOK IL— CHAPTER I. 
Angela arrives at Brescia — Her efforts to es- 
tablish a Congregation — Her life at Brescia 
—Supernatural favors and lights — Her skill 
in directing minds — She reconciles inveterate 
enemies. -------45 

CHAPTER n. 

Saint Angela makes a pilgrimage to Mantua 
— Prince Alloysius Gonzaga — Her pilgrim- 
age to the Holy Land — Loses her sight — 
Her courage in continuing her pilgrimage — 
She visits the holy places^ — Recovers her 
sight — Fearful tempest, etc. - - - 55 

CHAPTER in. 

Angela's stay at Venice — She repairs to Rome 
1* (i>) 



I 



6 CONTENTS. 

— Jubilee of 1525 — Clement YII. welcomes 
her — Return to Brescia — Yisit of the Duke 
of Milan — She retires to Cremona during the 
war — A mortal malady brought on by her 
austerities — Her extraordinary recovery. - 6T 

CHAPTER IV. 

Saint Angela returns to Brescia^ — Her extacies 
— She is endowed with the spirit of prophecy 
— She consults Dom Serafino di Bologna as 
to her Institute — She assembles twelve com- 
panions — Visits Milan — Founds her first 
house at Brescia — Apparition of Our Lord. 80 

BOOK III.— CHAPTER I. 

Foundation of the order of St. Ursula — Its ob- 
jects and labors — Vocations of the new order 
— Its form — They are called the Divine 
Company — First Chapter of the order — Vir- 
tues of the first Ursulines — Rules and For- 
mulas — Directors and protectresses of the 
order — St. Angela wishes to resign the posi- 
tion as Superior — She seeks the approbation 

of the Holy See. 91 

CHAPTER n. 

Counsels of Mother Angela to the Governesses 
and officers of the Order. - - - - lOY 

CHAPTER III. 

Hopes of St. Angela^s recovery — She makes 
her will — Appoints the Countess Lucre tia 
Lodronne her successor — Her last words — 
Her holy death — General veneration for her 

sanctity. 119 

BOOK IV. — CHAPTER I. 

Consternation of the Ursulines after the death 
of Saint Angela — The Countess of Lodronne 
second superior of the order, reads publicly 
the will of Saint Angela — The provisions of 
this Testament. ----- 130 



CONTENTS. 7 

CHAPTER II. 

The address of tne Countess Lueretia--Her elec- 
tion as Superior of the Society — Her piety 
and ability — Confirmation of the order by 
Pope Paul III. in 1544 — The TJrsulines as- 
sume a particular habit — Spread of the order 
— They acquire the Church of St. Bridget 
— Death of the Countess. - - - - 144 
CHAPTER ni. 

Saint Charles Borromeo and the Society of 
Saint Ursula — Establishment of the Congre- 
gation of Milan — They become cloistered — 
Saint Charles, Visitor General of the order — 
Acquires the church and priory of Saint 
Benedict for the order — Regulations intro- 
duced by him — Establishments in his dio- 
cese — His death — Congregation of the order 
at Parma, Foligny, Venice, Cremona, Ve- 
rona, Veltri, Genoa and Rome. - - 151 

CHAPTER IV. 

Extension of the order of Saint Ursula in 
France — Mother Frances de Bermond — Con- 
gregation of Avignon — Devotion to Saint, 
Angela — Her beatification by Pope Pius VI. 
— She is canonized by Pope Pius VII. - rtO 

BOOK V. — CHAPTER I. 

Mother de Bermond — Foundress of the French 
Ursulines — Her labors — Blessed Mary of 
the Incarnation, and Madame de Sainte 
Beuve — The Ursulines of Paris — Pope Paul 
V. erects the community into a religious 
order — Mother Cecilia the first Ursuline 
Nun — Spread of the order in France. - 16T 

CHAPTER n. 

Mother de Bermond, foundress of the first 
French Congregation of Ursulines, founds 



8 CONTFNTS. 

the XJrsuline Nuns of Lyons — The Ursulines 
of Toulouse and Bordeaux result from this 
foundation — Extension of these branches of 
the order — Other branches of the order in 
France — The French Revolution — XJrsuline 
Martyrs. ------- I'jg 

CHAPTER m. 
Ursuline Convents in Canada and Louisiana — 
Mother Mary of the Incarnation — The Con- 
vent of Quebec- — The Ursulines of Three 
Rivers and their Hospital — The Ursulines 
of New Orleans. - - - - -189 

CHAPTER IV. 

The Ursuline Convent of New Orleans — Mo- 
ther Mary Tranchepain de Saint Augustin 
— Their hospital and asylums — Filiation of 
this house — Convents of Havana — Convents 
of Galveston and San Antonio. - - - 200 

BOOK VI.— CHAPTER I. 

The Irish Ursulines — Miss Nano Nagle — Con- 
vent of Black Rock, Cork — Filiations in Ire- 

' land — In the United States — The Convent 
in New York — The Convent in Charleston- 
Its removals. - - - - - - 221 

CHAPTER n. 

The Ursuline Convent at Boston and Charles- 
town — Its founder, the Rev. John Thayer— 
The Ryan family — The foundation of the 
house — Death of the two Misses Ryan— Dif- 
ficulties of the house — The riot and destruc- 
tion of the Convent. ... - 232 
CHAPTER in. 

Other Ursuline Convents in the United States, 
and their origin — The Convent of Brown 
County, Ohio— The Convent in Cleveland — 
The Convent in St. Louis— The Convent in 
Morrissania — Convent at Sault St. Mary's. 243 



LIFE 

OP 

SAINT ANGELA MERICL 

BOOK I. 



CHAPTER L 

Birth of Saint Angela — Her precocious love of 
retirement — Her austere life — Death of her 
parents, 

Angela was born on the 21st of March, in the 
year 1474, as seems most probable, at Dezanzano, 
a little town in Italy, situated on Lake Garda, 
in Bressano, diocese of Verona, six leagues from 
Brescia. Her father^s name was John Merici, 
and her mother was of the family of the Branco- 
zis of Salo. 

It is generally believed that this family was 
not favored with worldly wealth; yet grave 
authors have supposed the parents of Saint An- 
gela to have been of noble extraction. They 
cultivated their patrimony ; but in the republic 
of Venice it was not deemed derogatory to an 
illustrious birth to till the heritage of their 
fathers. The name of Merici subsisted in honor 
as late as the last century, in some cities of the 
empire. 

9 



10 LIFE OP 



Whatever be the fact as to this conjecture, 
which matters little to the merit of the illustri- 
ous Saint whose virtues we are about to recount ; 
all authors agree that her parents were at least 
distinguished by their piety and enjoyed the fa- 
vor of all good men. God vouchsafed to bless the 
union of these virtuous spouses by giving them 
several children, among the rest two daughters, 
the younger of whom received in baptism the 
name of Angela. Happy name, inspired by Pro- 
vidence, who foresaw that she was to lead an 
angelic life on earth. 

These two sisters were brought up under the 
paternal roof, which was a real sanctuary of 
piety. When describing the care which God 
takes of his elect, the holy King David compares 
them to the eagles that the mother bears under 
her wings, to accustom them to take their jflight, 
and strengthen to bear the rays of the sun ; so, 
these two daughters of Merici received in the 
boeom of their family, those sound lessons which 
strengthen faith and are never more efficacious 
than in tender youth. An angel seemed ever to 
watch over their innocence. Angela especially 
displayed her virtue as soon as reason began to 
be developed. Grace seemed stamped in every 
line of her countenance ; an amiable purity adorn- 
ed her brow, and the innocence that lit up her eyes 



SAINT ANGELA MEKICI. 11 



led all to virtue. At the age of seven she had 
learned that modesty should be the inseparable 
quality of her sex. Her timid looks showed the 
candor of her soul, and her actions were directed 
by a reason above her age. When spoken to of 
God, she felt her heart inflamed and ravished 
with love. Her sister followed her in all exer- 
cises of piety; both animated with the same spirit, 
spent their time in acts of virtue ; this was the 
subject of their ordinary conversation. The 
amusements of their early childhood consisted 
in raising little oratories, and arranging little 
altars. There they prayed and chanted, imita- 
ting the ceremonies of the Church. The fri- 
volous amusements and pastimes which other 
children seek so eagerly, had no charm for these 
two amiable sisters. 

Their parents remarked with inexpressible 
joy this precocious inclination for holy things. 
Astonished at such an extraordinary childhood, 
they felt assured that Angela especially was 
destined by Providence to become the instru- 
ment of some great design ; but they carefully 
dissembled their predilection for her. Still they 
thought that this child required particular atten- 
tion to second the views of heaven, and they omit- 
ed nothing that could contribute to her spirit- 
ual progress. Such was the proof of the election 



12 LIFE OF 



which God had made of Saint Angela. For ac- 
cording to the expression of the wise man, ** No 
one knoweth the care of his infinite wisdom nor 
the artifices which divine love can employ to 
win hearts." 

Often amid the family they conversed on the. 
greatness of God, his infinite goodness, his love 
for men. Every evening they read something, 
sometimes on the mystery of the day, sometimes 
in the lives of the Saints, or of the Father of 
the Desert. Thus did these religious parents 
edify each other amid their children, but they 
remarked with wonder the constant attention 
which little Angela gave these practices of piety. 
During the reading she seemed rapt and out of 
herself, and came forth from this exstacy only to 
express ingenuously her feelings towards Our 
Lord. 

What especially struck her in the lives of the 
ancient patriarchs, was their courage, in forsak- 
ing all to tread in our Saviour's footsteps. She 
often spoke of it, envying their lot. In conse- 
quence of these holy impressions, she one day 
conceived the idea of forming a kind of retreat 
in her room. Having communicated her pro- 
ject to her sister, the proposition was imme- 
diately accepted ; and from that moment they 
retired daily at certain hours, into the little 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 13 



oratory. There prostrate before the altar they 
chanted the praises of the Lord. There they 
prayed with admirable outpourings of the heart; 
and to hear them speak of God, they might have 
been taken for most consummate masters of the 
spiritual life. Astonishing at so tender an age ! 
To these exterior acts of piety, Angela added 
the rigors of penance. She most frequently 
slept on the ground, and always continued to 
deprive herself of something at her meals. Her 
delicate constitution would soon have sunk un- 
der the austerity of such penances, if her father 
had not compelled her to relax them, so complete- 
ly had the love of God inflamed the heart of 
that young virgin ! When they perceived that 
her health was afl'ected, she was questioned to 
elicit the cause, she would have blushed even to 
excuse herself by an untruth, and without con- 
cealment declared the whole truth. Her father 
praised her sincerity, but he forbid these aus- 
terities which he deemed impracticable at so 
tender an age. She yielded for some time to 
this injunction, but gradually gave way to the 
irresistible inclination that led her to return to 
the kind of life which she had practiced at first. 
While her sister who was charged with observ- 
ing her, yielded to sleep, Angela adroitly left 

her bed and spent a part of the night in prayer. 

2 



14 LIFE OP 



Then it was that she spoke to God heart to heart, 
and in this solitude too he communicated his 
graces to her. She soon understood what the 
Divine Master required of her ; and consulting 
only the holy ardor of pure love that consumed 
her, she pronounced the vow of virginity in the 
firm conviction that this sacrifice would be pleas- 
ing to the Almighty. 

Her zeal in inspiring the heart of her neighbor 
with the spirit which animated her, did not per- 
mit her to hide in silence the holy engagement 
which she had contracted. She disclosed it to 
her sister to gain her to Christ, and she succeed- 
ed. How indeed could that tender companion 
resist such a solicitation ? "We are " said Angela, 
**the children of the Saints, can we seek else- 
where than in heaven our true country ? Let 
us turn our affections to Him who resides there. 
In order to follow Jesus Christ, we must indeed 
die wholly to self; but by self-denial and suffer- 
ing, we shall attain the bliss of eternity ? Was 
it not thus that Our Lord entered into the possess- 
ion of his glory ? Remember, too, sister, what 
we have been told of the tribulations and hard- 
ships endured by virgins and solitaries to merit 
the crown of immortality ? The holy books that 
we have heard, made me make up my mind to 
complete the sacrifice. Can you sister, be un- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 15 



moved by them ? Ah 1 1 perceive that you too, 
yield to the grace which calls us." She could not 
in fact resist such pressing solicitations ; and 
Angela's first companion was the first conquest 
that grace enabled her to obtain. 

God had prompted the daughters of Merici to 
make this sacrifice in order to prepare them to 
offer Him one still more painful to nature. 
Their loving father, though scarcely forty years 
of age, was atacked by a violent disease which 
carried him off in a few years. The whole fam- 
ily bitterly deplored this loss ; Angela especially 
seemed inconsolable. Yet her mother was 
left to her, and she flattered herself that Provi- 
dence would preserve her to her, so as not to 
deprive her of all consolation on earth. *'Let 
us weep no longer, mother" she said, *'God has 
doubtless wished to become your only spouse : 
he will be too the father of your little ones. We 
should be unworthy of his goodness if our sub- 
mission to his holy will did not induce us to 
calm our grief Yet the good widow was not 
long to survive her husband. She first fell in- 
to a state of languor, which gave rise to serious 
fears. Remedies were resorted to, but proved 
unavailing. Angela's mother expired in the most 
heart'felt sentiments of piety, commending her 
children to God. 



16 LIFE OP 



Her daughters received with her last blessing 
the expression of these sentiments ; in the first 
burst of her grief she felt tempted to murmur 
against Providence. '^But what was I going to 
say, my God/' she cried, " pardon my unbound- 
ed grief; pardon the youthful wandering of my 
mind. I adore without comprehending thy de- 
signs on me, whatever they may be. Has not 
this chastisement overtaken me for having loved 
my parents to the prejudice of the love which is 
due to thee above all? Thou deprivest me of 
them now to teach me henceforward to turn to 
thee alone." 

Thus spoke this model of young virgins, in 
the presence of a number of friends who took a 
lively interest in the bereaved family. A heart 
less perfect than Angela's would have been dis- 
couraged at so overwhelming a position : but 
God gave her strength to bear it, by inspiring 
her with a perfect resignation. 



SAIKT ANGELA MERICI. 17 



CHAPTER 11. 

Jlngela and her sister at their uncleh — They re- 
tire to a hermitage — Their taste for solitude 
— Death of her Sister — Miraculous appari- 
tion — Angela makes her first communion. 

The two orphans had at Salo (a town in the dis- 
trict of Bressano) an uncle named Biancozi, a rich 
and highly esteemed man, but still more worthy 
of respect for his religious sentiments. Touched 
with the condition of his nieces, he resolved to 
be a father to them and took them to his house, 
after arranging their temporal affairs. With 
him Angela continued to follow the plan of life 
which she had formed in her father^s house. 
Every hour was allotted either to work or to 
spiritual exercises. The virtuous Biancozi, who 
watched over her with a special care, soon per- 
ceived that she practiced abstinences and austeri- 
ties extraordinary for a child of her years. 
Happily she had inspired him with a kind of 
veneration that made him fearful of opposing by 
remonstrance God^s will in her regard. 

Pious as was her uncle's house, her heart was 
not yet fully satisfied. She found it little adapt- 
ed to her inclination for solitude. What are 
we doing here," she would often say to her sis- 



18 LIFE OP 



ter, ** exposed as all are in the world? Has not 
God created us for himself alone ? Will he suf- 
fer our hearts to be shared between Him and 
creatures ? Ah I sister, let us fly the society 
of men, which can at any moment ruin us, and 
let us seek a retreat, where we can please only 
Jesus, whom we have chosen as our spouse.'' 

Such was the conversation of these young sis- 
ters, more united by the happy sympathy of re- 
ligious sentiments even than by the bonds of 
nature. The love of God which animated them, 
soon increased in their hearts to such a degree, 
that the world became insupportable. Angela 
moreover received no impulse from heaven to 
which she did not endeavor to correspond. One 
day, they went out early under the pretext of 
hearing mass, at a church outside of the town. 
As soon as the holy sacrifice was ended, they 
hastened with no guide but the inspiration of 
heaven to conceal themselves in a hermitage. 
Having thus withdrawn from the vanities of the 
world, they wished to pass their life in the most 
intimate union with God. But they had in his eyes 
only the merit of their goodwill, as it was impos- 
sible that the knowledge of their flight could 
long escape their uncle's wise vigilance. He 
sought them and had search made for them in 
the houses and churches where he thought they 



SAINT ANGELA. MERICI. 19 



might be found. The first steps were unavail- 
ing, and Biancozi whose anxiety was extreme, 
formed a thousand conjectures. He dwelt on 
the thought, that the two girls had several times 
in his presence conversed on the charms of a 
solitary life. Then he left the town, explored 
the country around ; at last after a thousand in- 
quiries finds traces of them and reaches the spot 
of their retreat. 

It would be difficult to express the impression 
produced on the two solitaries by the sight of 
an uncle whom they loved and respected as a 
father. How should they justify such a flight ? 
For the supernatural inclination that impelled 
them to seek a retreat, must appear blamable 
in the eyes of men. They had therefore to hear 
many reproaches on the want of confidence 
which they had shown in their second father; the 
imprudence of their conduct ; on the dangers to 
which they had so unreflectingly exposed them- 
Belves. Still Biancozi tempered by mildness, 
observations, which he then deemed most just ; he 
added marks of interest and affection, and thus 
brought back to Salo the two runaway maidens. 

The evasion had been noised about the town ; 
some regarded it as a childish freak, others as 
the result of a passing fervor ; but wiser heads 
conjectured that there might be something 



20 LIFE OP 



extraordinary in their determination. Biancozi 
who better than any other knew the solid 
piety of his nieces, had ere long no doubt but 
that heaven had a considerable part in that re- 
lation. 

In this persuasion he in future refrained from 
offering any obstacle to their decided taste for 
solitude. He permitted them to form in the 
most retired part of his house a narrow cell, as 
well to satisfy the inclination for retirement 
which thev continued to show, as to assure the 
preservation of the two children, whom he regard- 
ed as a blessing for his family. Angela and her 
sister accordingly began to lead in that house a 
purely angelical life. Their time was divided 
between meditation^ prayer, pious reading and 
work ; they went out only through obedience, or 
to visit the church. 

So perfect a life led by two children, the eld- 
est of whom was scarcely fourteen, could come 
only from extraordinary movements of grace. 
We can indeed conceive that when God has fix- 
ed his choice on a soul ; when it enters into his 
ineffable designs to raise it to a state of sanctity, 
he appropriates it to himself in an especial man- 
ner, to communicate his admirable and divine 
inspirations. In this way the saints participate 
in some sort even in this life in the sanctity of 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 21 



God himself, as the crystal does in the rays of 
the sun. Public opinion conformed to this sen- 
timent, for it was the general impression in the 
town, that the hand of the Lord was over these 
two maidens. 

Meanwhile it had been decreed in the adora- 
ble designs of Providence that this pure and 
delightful union should be broken. Angela lost 
her sister at the moment when she would seem 
least to expect it. A premature death severed her 
from that tender companion with whom she truly 
formed but one heart and one soul. As the happi- 
ness which she had tasted in her society was great, 
80 the bitterness of the separation was painful to 
be borne. Perfect as virtue may be, it cannot ex- 
tinguish natural sensibility. Her heart was 
tossed by a thousand feelings in the deplorable 
isolation in which this death had plunged her. 
Her sister had in fact been her guardian angel 
ever since she lost the authors of her days. 
Yet her grief was not of such a character as to 
diminish the merit of her resignation. She felt 
to her heart's core the blow with which the hand 
of th^ Lord had visited her; but her patience 
was greater than her grief was deep. ''What 
am I ?" she would say to the persons who came 
to console her : ''what am I to oppose the will of 
my God ? My sister belonged to him, he could 



22 LIFE OF 



then call her to him and deprive me of her. 
Blessed be his holy name now and forever. '' 
The holy will of God is then her whole support 
and sole consolation in this sad moment : and 
this one thought, God wills it, is enough to bring 
a calm to her soul, and repress all the thoughts 
that agitate it. Yet memory came from time to 
time to trouble the calm which her resignation 
brought. Her sister died so suddenly, that it 
was impossible to administer the sacrament. 
Angela would fain have been appeased as to the 
eternal lot of her soul. This disquieting desire 
often recurred to her, absorbing her whole mind. 
She began to pray more fervently than ever, to 
obtain of God the signal grace of some assur- 
ance on this point. She formed her petition with 
such simplicity of heart and so ardent a faith, 
that she became persuaded that God would grant 
her tlie favor. 

It belongs only to the saints to be animated with 
such faith, and we are permitted to believe that 
God inspired his hand-maid with this thought, 
to favor her with an extraordinary grace. A 
fortnight had elapsed since Angela lost her 
sister ; and heaven had not yet spoken. Her 
uncle having conceived the idea of sending her 
into the country, as well to distract her mind 
as to superintend the labors of the reapers; 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 2 



Q 



scarcely had she reached a road called the nar- 
row one, when she perceived above her a lum- 
inous cloud, and having stopped to regard the 
phenomenon. '' Suddenly !^^ says the bull of her 
canonization, *'the Virgin Mother of God appear- 
ed to her with her sister, who, all radiant with 
light and attended by a host of angels, urged her 
to pursue with constancy the path of perfection, 
promising her one day a share in her glory. ^' 
The cloud vanished but the young servant of 
God was left in an astonishment that threw her in- 
to an exstacy. Returning to her natural state, she 
was seized with a new 'flame of love that filled 
her heart with the liveliest joy. 

She had not yet made her first communion 
though now thirteen. It seems strange that in- 
structed as she was, she had not sooner received 
that bread of life that would have been indeed 
for her angelical nourishment. But she lived; 
in an age, when Christians, criminally lax, ap- 
proached but rarely the august sacrament of our 
altars. God, doubtless, had chosen Saint An- 
gela to serve as an example, and to revive in 
this respect the piety of the faithful ; for, he 
planted in her heart a peculiar devotion to the 
most holy sacrament of the Eucharist. 

It needed many entreaties on her part, before 
her uncle, pious as he was, would permit her to 



24 LIFE OP 



prepare for her first communion. Respectfully 
and yet firmly she told him how she feared lest she 
too, like her sister, might die without receiving 
the holy Eucharist, adding that in her earnest 
desire to receive her Saviour; she felt inspired 
to despise the vain reasoning of men. Biancozi 
could not withstand such pressing solicitations. 
He took his niece to the parish priest ; when 
she was questioned, amid the children of her 
age, all present wondered at the wisdom and 
modesty of her answers. 

God had given her from her tenderest years 
an ardent desire of holy communion. No sooner 
had she been admitted to partake of this great 
mystery, than she resolved to taste as frequently 
as possible of the heavenly banquet. She ran 
to it like the panting hart to the waters of the 
limpid fountain. Urged by her extraordinary 
love, that she had conceived for this adorable 
sacrament, she clung to it with such zeal that 
it became her almost daily nourishment. Her 
example revived the declining piety of the 
whole town of Salo. It was indeed an edifying 
spectacle for the people to behold her communi- 
cate so frequently, and with a fervor that never 
belied itself. Her modesty in the holy place, 
her profound recoUectedness in the presence of 
God, were as striking as they were extraordi- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 25 



nary, and unfortunately too rare, even in Italy 
the centre of Catholicity. This manner of loving 
won her immense treasures of merits ; for who 
can doubt that our Lord uses the Eucharist to 
purify our souls from all earthly affections ; and 
to inflame our hearts with the fire of purest love ! 
Thus did he confirm Angela in virtue, and lay 
the foundation of the virtue to which he wished 
to exalt her. 



CHAPTER III. 

Saint Angela enters the Third Order of Saint 
Francis — Her austerities — her temptations — 
Death of her uncle, Biancozi — She forms a 
community of Sisters of the Third Order ^ at 
Desenzano— Resolves to devote herself to the 
education of youth. 

Yet Angela felt that her fervor was not en- 
tirely free amid the world, especially on account 
of the unhappy times in which she lived. Fear- 
ful lest her exalted piety should cause the weak 
to murmur, she resolved to deprive them of the 
slightest pretext by connecting herself with 
some religious congregation. There was then 
at Salo a confraternity of the third order of 

3 



26 LIFE OP 



Saint Francis,^ the members of which were 
united in a special profession of piety. Having 
one day attended the exercises practised at their 
meetings, Angela felt so edified that she was 
persuaded that God called her to join it. On 
presenting herself to the superior, she obtained 
permission to enter on her noviceship, and as- 
sume the habit. Pqstulants, were usually sub- 
jected to a yearns probation before their profes- 
sion; but Angela displayed such fervor in all 
the exercises ; she was moreover so well known 
for the purity of her life, and the reputation 
of her virtues, that they deemed proper to 
except her from the ordinary rule ; she pronoun- 
ced her vows after six month's novitiate, and took 
the name of Sister Angela. 

From that moment she gave no limit to her 
zeal for frequent communion. Her director 
permitted her to receive it daily, aid she was re- 

* Saint Francis of Assissium had founded the Order of 
Friars Minor in 1221, and soon after that of Saint Clare. 
To these first creations he added another, which like it, 
produced most precious fruits of salvation. It was institu- 
ted for the sake of the people, to whom he announced the 
word of God, and took the name of the third order. The 
object of the holy founder was to afford the faithful the 
means of leading a life like that of his religious, with- 
out practising its austerities. Saint Louis, King of France, 
and Saint Elizabeth of Hungary, were members of this con- 
gregation. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. JSJ 



lieved from all fear of appearing singular. She 
was seen endeavoring to render herself worthy 
by her extreme application to advance in per- 
fection. She was truly dead to the world, and 
her life was hidden with Christ in God. In all 
things she tried to subject her senses, to over- 
come her inclinations, and to abandon her soul 
to the guidance and movements of grace. In one 
word, she thought solely now of establishing in 
her heart the kingdom of God, and there it was 
that she expected to reap the effects of her fre- 
quent communion. Grace in fact spreads a great 
light in the souls which it illumines, as it is easy 
to remark in the lives of the Saints. It is at 
first, if you will, a stream fed by the purest 
fountain ; but soon other waters come to swell 
its tide, and form a river, that flows majestically 
on, spreading fertility on all around it. 

After Angela had taken the vow of poverty, 
which was however only a simple vow, she ob- 
served it so exactly that she would possess 
nothing as her own. In spite of her uncle's re- 
monstrance she lived solely on alms. There was 
no furniture in her cell; she took her rest on a 
mat, with a stone for her pillow. The only in- 
dulgence which she allowed herself, was from 
time to time taking for her bed a heap of faggots. 
** Am I not even so, better off," she would say, 



28 LIFE OP 



'* than the Saviour of the world. He at the 
moment of his birth had no place to rest his 
head?'' 

All in her showed the spirit of poverty. Her 
clothes were of unexampled modesty, and they 
covered the harsh and heavy hair cloth that she 
never laid aside night nor day. She fasted 
habitually, and took no food but bread and 
water, with unseasoned herbs. In Lent she ate 
only on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, and 
on those days upheld her sinking frame only 
with a little bread and a few chesnuts. Wine 
she used only at Christmas and Easter, or when 
the physician prescribed it in her time of sick- 
ness. These facts related by contemporary 
authors, are resumed by Pope Pius VIL, in the 
bull of the Saint's canonization. 

*' She frequently," adds the brief, " passed a 
whole week fasting, contenting herself with the 
eucharistic food." The eucharist that heavenly 
manna was then her only food in the desert of 
this life. It is a kind of miracle that she was 
able to support life, notwithstanding the exhaus- 
tion to which abstinence of this kind must have 
reduced her. 

We cannot indeed avoid the conviction, that 
Saint Angela was raised up by the Almighty to 
give to the world once more the example of those 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 29 



miraculous austerities of the fathers ot the des- 
ert, during the first ages of Christianity. The 
age in which she lived needed great lessons to 
draw it from the material habits into which it 
had sunk, from its indifference to the works of 
God ; an indefinable torpidity had seized all 
minds: and it required the spectacle of more than 
ordinary virtue to rouse them from this unhappy 
state. When we read, in fact, the lives of the 
solitaries of the first ages of the church, they 
seem to us to be more like angels than men. 
Thousands of anehorites peopled the Thebais, 
practising the most extraordinary austerities. 
They ate only at long intervals, and their repast 
consisted only of a little bread and water with a 
few wild herbs. On solemn days only did they 
add a little salt, but never was the scanty meal 
touched before sunset. The greatest number 
ate only thrice a week. Providence had raised 
up these extraordinary virtues to effect the con- 
version of idolatrous nations, habituated to sat- 
isfy all that the senses exact, to give way to the 
most gross and material inclinations. The Al- 
mighty wished to be himself the virtue and 
strength of these illustrious penitents, and 
bring them to find charms in austerities that 
shock the most our frail human nature. 

3# 



30 LIFE OF 



Would it not seem that a maiden so perfect^ 
so retired from the world should be exempted 
from all temptation? Every day she mortified 
her body; every day she offered herself to God 
a victim vowed to sacrifice. In vain she died 
to herself and sin, the demon of voluptuousness 
came to trouble her in her poor cell. Often too^ 
he endeavored to seduce her by thoughts of 
pride. But so perseveringly did she battle with 
these temptations, that she remained triumph- 
ant. Yet this made her only more austere and 
more watchful over her senses. *' Those who 
are of Christ, " says the apostle, *' have cruci- 
fied the fle&h with all its concupiscences." The 
mortification of the senses is then intimately 
connected with the Christian life, but it is es- 
pecially the portion of the elect. The love of 
God which fills them, renders them ingenious in 
inventing a thousand ways of practising it. They 
do not confine themselves to ordinary mortifica- 
tions, but invent new ones day by day. 

Thus lived Saint Angela during the five years 
that she spent in the town of Salo, after her en- 
trance into the third order of Saint Francis. Al- 
though she endeavored constantly to hide her 
good works, she nevertheless obtained such a repu- 
tation for sanctity, that she was commonly named 
the Saint or the Virgin of Christ. The auster- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. St 



ity of her life had not altered the sweetness of 
her conversation ; for charity, according to the 
Apostle, is patient, full of benignity and easily 
forgets self to attend only to the interests of its 
neighbor, to which alone it is sensible. Solitude 
and the exercise of prayer were doubtless the 
dearest delights of the young virgin ; but the 
zeal which animated her for the salvation of 
souls, and the holy ardors of her charity led 
her to renounce her sweetest consolations to 
give her time to her neighbor. She did not 
therefore refuse to appear in the world, when 
she foresaw that her presence would do any good, 
or when she found an opportunity of fulfilling 
any work of charity. 

Meanwhile she experienced the loss of her un- 
cle who had brought her up as his own daughter. 
She had now only distant relatives at Salo, and 
accordingly resolved to return to her birthplace, 
"wnere she hoped to be still more useful to her 
neighbor. 

Saint Angela had been struck from her earli- 
est years with the general corruption remarka- 
ble in her age. A culpable torpidity seemed to 
absorb even those families in which faith and 
morality had been preserved. After endeav- 
oring in the presence of God to discover the 
cause, she thought that she discovered it in the 



32 LIFE OP 



negligence prevalent as to the education of the 
young, and especially of girls. Destined as they 
are by Providence to lay the first germs of faith 
in the bosom of families, how can women, them- 
selves brought up without religious principles, 
make them relished by their children ? Thus to- 
wards the close of the fifteenth century wag evil 
perpetuated with fearful progression ; for the in- 
difi'erence that had crept into the bosom of even 
the best houses, ingendered there depravity of 
manners, a spirit of skepticism, in fine that lib- 
erfcinage gained which leads so surely to libert- 
inage of the heart. *'The pious and holy edu- 
cation of girls, '^ continues the Sovereign Pontiff 
Pius VII, "is a fruitful source of blessings for 
religion and even for society. ^' * 

Angela communicated these reflections to her 
sisters of the third order, who all seemed touch- 
ed by their importance. *^ I can," she said, 
** dispose at Desenzano, of my father^s house ; if 
you will follow me there we shall devote our- 
selves to the education of youth. We shall, no 
doubt, have much to undergo ; but we must 
plough and sow in order to reap. Nor let our 
scanty number discourage us, God will infalli- 
bly be with us, as we labor for His sake. The 

* Bull of the Canonization of Saint Angela. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 33 



success of our undertaking depends then on our 
good will ! " This proposition was accepted 
unanimously^ for Angela had long since won the 
confidence of her Sisters. These pions maidens 
asked only a brief delay to obtain the consent of 
their families, and immediately after that hast- 
ened to Desenzano. This was about the year 
1495. It is believed that they were four in 
number. Angela must then have been about 
twenty-one years of age. The remembrance of 
the virtues which she had displayed in child- 
hood had not been effaced from the memory of 
the town's folk and the merits of her family 
were still appreciated. 

Before commencing the work which they had 
in view, these holy maidens endeavored to gain 
the confidence of the population amid which 
they wished to carry on their interesting mis- 
sion. What they did became more efficacious 
as it was unexampled. They set to work for 
the poor and for their own part lived solely on 
the alms of the faithful. They were ever the 
first at the offices of the Church. At appointed 
hours they proceeded to the Church to adore 
the Blessed Sacrament. This conduct edified 
the whole parish ; but public admiration seemed 
riveted particularly on Sister Angela, wherever 
Providence called her to labor for the salvatioa 



34 LIFE OP 



of souls. Her sublime piety was blended with 
a modesty and a calm of soul and even a gay- 
ety so charming that she won at once love and 
admiration. Her gentleness had a pecul- 
iar charm for winning its way into the minds of 
those who knew her, and her words went 
straight to the heart of those with whom she 
conversed. Her severity in her own regard 
was equalled only by her mildness, complaisance 
and goodness to others. Her aim was to make 
those who approached her relish the good things 
of eternity and induce them to despise the world : 
to make them practise virtue and bring them 
insensibly to works of penance. Above all 
things she recommended the frequentation of 
the sacraments of Penance and the Eucharist. 
She was often seen laying aside her natural se- 
dateness to converse with the rudest men, whose 
esteem she soon obtained and thus gradually 
won them. The prudence evinced in these con- 
versations, joined to the sincerity remarked in 
them, soon acquired the esteem and even the 
respect of all classes of society. To her com- 
panions she was rather the friend than the su- 
perior and she ever anticipated their wishes by 
the most delicate attention. Notwithstanding 
her predilection for solitude, she lent herself 
with unparalleled complaisance to afford them 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 35' 



all the relaxations that were not incompatible 
with the kind of life which they had embraced. 
Yet ever attentive to the mortification of the 
senses, she did not lose sight of it even in their 
hours of recreation, She frequently thence 
took occasion to edify her sisters by incidents 
which show how far she carried her self-contempt. 
One day as she sat with them near the flowery 
shore of the Lago di Garda, all admired the 
beauty of the landscape ; when one of the young- 
er sisters made this reflection : *^ Another thing 
strikes me at this moment! " said she, ^' and at- 
tracts my attention fall as much ; it is Sister 
Angolans magnificent head of hair." The others 
had the weakness to add to this remark, think- 
ing perhaps that such applause would please her 
whom they regarded as their superior. But the 
virgin of Desenzano had long since combatted 
these puerile vanities : and on the spot reprov- 
ed her companions with a tone of severity not 
ordinary with her. ** I blush, '* said she, '* to 
have been innocently the occasion of so ill-timed 
a remark ; but I am still more ashamed of you 
for not fearing to make it." The virtuous maid- 
ens then opened their eyes to the extent of their 
indiscretion. Angela received their excuse 
with a sentiment of humility that rendered her 
more venerable ; but she could not forgive the 



36 LIFE OP 



hair that had thus exposed her to tempta- 
tion ; in a few months it was no longer to be 
recognized ; so much did she fear pleasing any- 
one but Jesus Christ whom she had taken as 
her spouse. 



CHAPTER IV. 

Apparition of the mysterious ladder — God re- 
veals his designs in her regard — Efforts of 
Angela^ s zeal at Desenzano — Her trials — The 
Pentegoli family — Her projected house at 
Brescia. 

The spirit of light which penetrated Angela, 
could not fail to make her enter into communi- 
cation with God. It was during one of these 
walks that he vouchsafed to manifest his designs 
as to her. She had that day with her sisters 
directed her steps to a desert hermitage at some 
distance from Desenzano. When they had ac- 
cording to custom said their beads, they resolved 
to proceed a little further into the country. 
Angela remained alone to pray. As soon as 
her sisters had got to a short distance, she entered 
into a profound meditation conjuring the God 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 37 



of light to illuminate her as to the resolution 
which she had formed of devoting herself to the 
instruction of youth. Scarcely had she ended 
her prayer, when she perceived in the upper 
regions of the air a mysterious ladder that reach- 
ed up to the heavens. A numerous band of vir- 
gins, and a choir of angels alternately descended 
the steps of this ladder ; their brows encircled 
by jewelled crowns, and the angels filling all 
around with music from their melodious harps. 
Angela easily understood the mystery of this 
vision ; she felt convinced that the Almighty ap- 
proved the project which she had conceived. 
To complete the favor he deigned to explain 
himself in these words: ^'Angela, thou shalt not 
leave this world without founding a society of 
virgins like those that have just appeared to 
thee." It would be impossible to depict the 
holy awe of this young and faithful spouse of 
Christ on hearing the voice of her sovereign 
Lord. ^' What am I, Lord ? " she cried, fall- 
ing prostrate on the earth, ^* what am I that I 
should enjoy so wonderful a communication ? 
Canst thou employ so wretched a being as I am 
to accomplish thy designs ? I durst not think 
of such an enterprise, believing myself destined 
to serve, or at most to make thy holy name 
known and adored in mv native place. Rely- 

4 ' 



38 LIFE OP 



ing on thy omnipotent support, I will go whith- 
ersoever thy Providence vouchsafes to call me." 
Scarcely had she uttered these words, when 
she perceived her companions. She hesitated 
at first as to the propriety of communicating to 
them the vision with which God had favored 
her. Her humility inspired her with some re- 
pugnance, but considering that it was for God^s 
glory, she felt inspired to speak unreservedly. 
She therefore told them that a great wonder had 
been wrought during their absence : that God 
had appeared to her to tell her that he approv- 
ed the project which they had conceived of de- 
voting themselves to the instruction of youth. 
^'Let us hasten," she cried, *^ to correspond to 
the designs of heaven and labor in concert to gain 
souls to Christ." These last words uttered 
with a tone of prophecy, and the accent of in- 
spiration, produced in her companions an im- 
pression which animated them with the noblest 
zeal to pursue the work which God had just im- 
posed upon them. They at once believed them- 
selves to be of the number of those virgins who 
had just appeared with so much glory; and on 
this hope they renewed to their venerable supe- 
rior their protestations of zeal to follow her, 
and to aid her in all that God should require of 
her. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 39 



Notwithstanding her blind confidence in the 
words of our Lord, Angela at first saw the 
impossibility of founding at that moment a 
house out of Desenzano. She waited therefore 
till Providence put in her hands elements which 
should lead her to hope that she did not count 
too much on her own strength. Nevertheless 
to show her submission to the will of God, she 
began to form a kind of novitiate ; she gathered 
the children of the town and its environs to 
teach them their catechism. Besides this the 
Sisters visited the poor and the sick, distribut- 
ing in alms what they had received for their 
own support. Their care extended too to adults 
who came in crowds to their conferences. They 
penetrated to the very work shops to instruct 
the artisans and exhort them to return to the 
way of salvation. 

Angela especially was tireless in the exercise 
of this ministry. How many young girls 
were indebted to her for the preservation of 
their innocence, or the reform of their lives! 
How many men did she not Avin from vice ! 
How many feeble Christians did she not pre- 
serve from the poison of error ! The reform 
of morals, the holy laws of the Church once 
more were put in vigor : youth thoroughly in- 
structed in the truths of religion, ignorance 



40 LIFE OP 



banished from all classes of society. Such were 
the happy results of the labors of this truly 
apostolic virgin. All for the gloky of God, 
she often repeated in order to banish the slight- 
est sentiment of self love. Did her Sisters 
seek to make her acknowledge the superiority 
of her talents, far from yielding, she humbled 
herself in their presence, esteeming herself the 
last and most useless of all. "Ever bear in 
mind,'' she would say, " that without God we 
can do nothing ; but that with the help of his 
grace we should dare and undertake all.'' Let 
us beware then of ever attributing any of our 
good works to ourselves, ever remembering that 
all the merit should redound to him alone," 
These counsels addressed to her little congre- 
gation were always received with perfect sub- 
mission ; for she spoke with an air and an ac- 
cent of conviction which never failed to per- 
suade. 

Several years had now elapsed since she be- 
gan her mission at Desenzano. She felt con- 
vinced that God called her to Brescia to create 
a more important house; but she awaited new 
orders from Providence. Yet the delay of 
heaven only inflamed her desire and increased 
her hope. '' The place of my birth," she would 
often say, *' has become a desert to me, since God 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. * 41 



has led me to regard Brescia as a promised land ; 
but the children of Israel spent forty years in 
tents, before entering into possession of the rich 
land of Canaan. I am doubtless too unworthy of 
the favors which God has revealed to me : he 
wished to try me long, as he did the Israelites, 
on account of my infidelities to his grace.'' 

This was not her only trial. The manifold 
conversions effected by her ministry naturally 
rendered her formidable to the enemy of salva- 
tion. Never accordingly had she more combats 
to sustain, it seemed as if all the powers of hell 
were let loose upon her. Weary of tempting 
her constantly to no purpose, the spirit of dark- 
ness appeared to her in her cell under the form 
of an angel of light ; he hoped to divert her 
from prayer, or at least to inspire her with some 
sentiments of vain glory. But her profound 
humility, the fasts and austerities which she 
practised, became so many bucklers that enabled 
her to ward off the attacks of the evil one. 
*' Begone," she cried, ^' spirit of falsehood. I 
am here in the presence of God. Thinkest thou 
to impose on me ? That glory that thou now 
assumest, thy pride has lost. Will it ever be thy 
cruel joy to torment and pervert Christians.? 
Again I say, begone, loathsome monster ; go into 

the abyss reserved for thee, proclaim thy de- 

4# 



42 LIFE OP 



feat and the triumph of the strong, the Al- 
mighty God, to whom I will ever remain at- 
tached." The phantom immediately disap- 
peared, and Angela melted into tears before 
the Lord, giving him a thousand thanks for 
having preserved her from the most pressing 
danger in which she had ever been. This vic- 
tory delivered her forever from such importun- 
ities. 

The humble hand-maid of the Lord had ac- 
quired the unanimous esteem of the province. 
Her unwearied zeal, and all her works of salva- 
tion had drawn upon her the public veneration. 
She was consulted and her prayers solicited from 
all sides, even from the city of Brescia. Men 
felt honored by a mementos conversation with 
her; and as she persisted in living solely on alms, 
all made this a pretext for inviting her to take 
a meal with them. She never acceeded to these 
requests, but when she had grounds to hope that 
she would effect some good in the company. 
Then she accommodated herself to the circum- 
stances ; and according to the counsel of Our 
Lord to his apostles, she took what was set be- 
fore her. Ever occupied with the interests of 
eternity, she knew how to make this distract- 
ion avail to piety; adroitly turning the conver- 
sation on the emptiness and futility of earthly 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 43 



things, on the sweetness of virtue, on the hid- 
eousness and shamefulness of vice. In fine she 
diffused such a charm in her conversation, that 
none ever wearied listening to her. 

Angela frequented with a holj prediliction 
the house of a gentleman of Brescia named Pen- 
tegoli, who every year spent the pleasant season 
on an estate that he had at Padinga, a hamlet 
near Desenzano, God had endowed this man 
with an ardent piety, which induced him to 
desire to have Mother Angela often in his house. 
She generally refused his offers, lest her frequent 
visits to that house, perfect as it was, should 
distract her from her habit. She went to Pen- 
tegoli's only once a week to obtain his protect- 
ion for her projected establishment at Brescia, 
and to be edified by the good example and holy 
emulation, which she received for every kind 
of good works. This intimacy which lasted ten 
years enabled Saint Angela to form other ac- 
quaintances not less precious ; for many came 
from Brescia to this gentleman's house to hear 
and consult her. 

Meanwhile the time approached when God 
was to fulfil his promise and grant the prayers 
of his humble hand-maid. Could Angela have 
supposed that a sad event was to give occasion 
to it? 



44 LIFE OP 



The year 1516 was already far advanced when 
Signor Pentegoli came to his country seat at 
Padinga. There he resided with his family till 
the end of the fall ; but scarcely had he return- 
ed to Brescia, when a great misfortune afflicted 
that house. Pentegoli lost in a short time 
two daughters, sole heiresses of his exalted for- 
tune. He was the more overwhelmed at this 
loss as his children blended with the nobility of 
their birth, the finest qualities of mind and heart. 
With all his piety Pentegoli seemed inconsol- 
able, and nothing could assuage his grief His 
wife still more unhappy, unceasingly bewailed 
her daughters, and it seemed as if the affliction 
would soon end the life of the disconsolate couple. 

At this painful juncture it occurred to them to 
invite Sister Angela to their house. So earnest- 
ly did they press her, that she could not resist 
their entreaties. She deliberated with her com- 
panions, and they thought the journey indispen- 
sable. After taking in community the measures 
necessary to continue in her absence the good 
effected at Desenzano, Angela immediately re- 
paired to Brescia. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 45 

BOOK II. 

CHAPTER I. 

Angela arrives at Brescia — Her efforts to estab- 
lish a Congregation — Her life at Brescia — 
Supernatural favors and lights — Her skill in 
directing minds — She reconciles inveterate 
enemies. 

Providence had directed the event related at 
the close of the last Book to afford Saint Angela 
an opportunityof settling permanently at Brescia, 
There she found Signer Pentegoli and his spouse 
plunged in the deepest and most bitter grief. 
Such was their situation that at first shi; knew 
not how she should be able to comfort them. 
Having learned to make herself all to all, after 
the example of the great Apostle, her first care 
was to sympathize with their sufferings; she 
questioned all the secrets of charity, in order at 
least to moderate their grief. Her presence and 
her conversation brought them gradually to a 
Christian resignation which till then they could 
not attain. They afterwards avowed that An- 
gela alone could have reconciled them to the 
sacrifice which God had required of them. 



46 LIFE OP 



The Saint had been but a few days at Brescia 
when the vision with which heaven had former- 
ly favored her, became the object of her constant 
thought. The grief of her hosts could not di- 
vert her from it ; and as soon as she had calm- 
ed them, she found herself in turn a prey to the 
most surprising agitation. In church as well as 
in the privacy of her chamber, she seemed ever 
to see that mysterious ladder, and that long line 
of virgins ascending to heaven with the angels 
who deigned to bear them thither. What struck 
her still more was, the words that had echoed in 
her ears after that wonderous apparition. It 
engaged her mind night and day, and she soon 
fell into such a state of agitation, that it became 
impossible for her to enjoy a moment's sleep. 
She was not long in understanding that such 
disquiets sprang from some extraordinary move- 
ment of grace. *^ What wilt thou have me do, 
my God?" she would say, ** Speak, thy ser- 
vant heareth, ready to obey thee in all things." 
Nor did heaven delay to manifest its will. A 
perfect calm succeeded the tumult that had troub- 
led her soul and she felt that God had heard her. 
She must now think of establishing a congrega- 
tion in Brescia, and renounce her stay at Des- 
enzano, where she had hitherto enjoyed so much 
consolation. This must have been an afflicting 



[ 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 4 



rr 



intelligence to the companions whom she had 
left there. It was necessary to remind them of 
the words of the divine oracle, which had once 
so deeply moved them, and show them that their 
superior would continue to maintain the most 
constant correspondence with them. 

From that moment Mother Angela seemed 
exclusively engaged in putting into operation the 
means most proper to facilitate the execution of 
her enterprise. She had now spent nearly four 
months with the Pentegolis, who both earnestly 
desired her to make their home her constant resi- 
dence. This house could not however serve to 
realize her project. To console them she prom- 
ised not to leave the city, or make them less the 
object of her gratitude and respect. Her sole 
aim in retiring was to choose a more secluded 
asylum, better adapted to the fulfilment of her 
engagement to God. Flattered by the revel- 
ation thus made, and full of veneration for An- 
gela, they undertook to find her a house such as 
she desired. 

There was then at Brescia a rich merchant 
named Mark Anthony Eomano, who had re- 
cently retired from business to devote his time 
to good works, and. lay up- riches in heaven. 
To him Pentegoli applied to find a retreat for 
Sister Angela. God had disposed the heart of 



48 LIFE OP 



this excellent man. He eagerly accepted the 
proposal made him, and immediately came to 
offer the pious virgin of Desenzano an apart- 
ment, which she gratefully accepted, yet without 
revealing God^s designs in her regard. For 
though she awaited the execution with a kind 
of impatience, the time had not yet come : twelve 
years were still to elapse before she revealed 
her secret entirely. This glorious destiny was 
the object of her continual meditations; and 
yet, strange enough, she never mentioned it, 
even to her most intimate friends. Her hu- 
mility made this a law, and human prudence 
wished her to be silent as to a project, the exe- 
cution of which she was to expect only from the 
sovereign Lord of all things. 

In her new abode she confined herself to pre- 
paring, as she had so long done, to see the days 
of the Lord, by the constant practice of all 
Christian virtues. On retiring to the cell which 
Romano had put at her disposal, she began to 
exercise all her former austerities, going out 
only to church. Her modesty in the streets was 
a model to the other women in the town. Her 
address was full of grace, and persons often 
stopped her to have a few moments conversa- 
tion with her. Then she spoke of God with 
such unction, that she almost always succeeded 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 49 



in enkindling the flames of divine love in the 
minds and hearts of those who heard her. The 
whole town w^as edified by her example ; each 
one envied the happiness of her host, and men 
of every condition regarded her as an angel 
from heaven. 

One day, as she was praying before the altar 
of Saint Nicholas in the church of the Augus- 
tinians, she was ravished in mind, and her body 
was raised from the ground in the sight of all 
present, who gave most authentic testimony of 
the fact. But Angela knew not what fame did 
not fail to publish to her advantage. An enemy 
of praise and laudation, her humility would have 
had much to suffer, if her acquaintance had not 
most carefully concealed from her what w^as said 
of her, and what was the public opinion of her 
virtues. To bestow any eulogium on her was 
enough to compel her to new and severer aus- 
terities. But the more she humbled herself 
in the presence of men, the more G-od displayed 
in her his glory and power. 

It was, in fact, at this epoch of her life, that 
the luimble virgin of Brescia found herself sud- 
denly favored with a supernatural science. With- 
out her having ever applied to the study of let- 
ters, without her frequenting the learned, she 
understood and spoke I^atin perfectlv. She 

5 



50 LIFE OP 



translated into Italian the liymns, and many of 
the prayers of the Church. Nay, more, she 
commented on diflBeult passages of Scripture, 
and discussed with admirable precision all 
points of dogmatic and moral theology. Never 
had such prodigious erudition appeared in a 
woman of that condition. Her host was the 
more surprised at it, as she had never displayed 
anything of the kind during the previous three 
years that she had lived in his house. But the 
news of this wonder soon spread over the town 
and its vicinity. Able theologians, distinguished 
preachers, and all the educated men of the 
country, flocked to hear her. They came espe- 
cially from Salo, Padua and Desenzano, where 
her companions continued to obtain by her in- 
structions and good example, the same fruit of 
salvation. To such a point was this carried, 
that Romano's house became in some sort a 
public school. There Angela received oral 
consultations, or gave them in writing, thus 
verifying the words of our Lord, when he af- 
firms that " God has concealed from the wise 
and prudent of this world," his secrets and the 
highest truths of salvation, ^^ and has revealed 
them to the little ones " and the humble. These 
consultations were enjoyed by those who asked 
them, and all left the saint edified and consoled. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 51 



A distinguished man in Brescia named Thomas 
Gaverdi, experienced this in particular. As- 
tonished like the rest at all that was said of the 
extraordinary lights of Sister Angela, he too re- 
solved to consult her ; but he wished to seize a 
moment when she was alone. ** I come," said 
he, " to ask a favor which I hope to obtain from 
your zeal. I should like to know the means 
of sanctifying myself in the world, where by 
my condition I am obliged to live. Tell me, I 
pray, what I must do, and speak without cere- 
mony ; for what brings me here, is the confidence 
and respect which you inspire. Be convinced, 
then, that I will take in good part, whatever 
advice you deem proper to give me." 

Angela was at first filled with confusion, and 
refused to advise a man of such standing ; but 
as he persisted, she said : *' As your lordship 
does me the honor to consult me, and ask my 
advice, I will, in spite of my ignorance and un- 
worthiness, speak according to the impulse of 
my conscience. The surest means of salvation 
are, to do every day of your life, what you would 
wish to have done at the moment of your death." 
These words, uttered with energy, went so di- 
rectly to the gentleman's heart, that he wrote 
them immediately on his tablets, so as not to 
forget them. He made it a rule to read them 



52 LIFE OP 



over every day ; and they sujfficed to remind 
him of his duty. He was often heard to say, 
that next to God he owed his salvation to Mo- 
ther Angela. 

It is also related that a student in the uni- 
versity of Padua, came to Brescia to consult 
her. His dress was extremely elegant ; his tone 
and manners showed an affectation, that even 
men of the world would have disapproved. An- 
gela in his presence assumed a severe air, and 
asked him what he wished. *'I am pursuing 
my studies," said he, *^ with the intention of en- 
tering the priesthood, and I desire to know 
whether 1 am really called by God.'' *' You 
seem governed by an air and by sentiments of 
vanity/' said she, ^' thafc convince me that your 
mind and heart greatly need a change, before 
entering a state where modesty is so necessary. 
Renounce first this luxury and superfluity in 
your dress, and then I will tell you what I think 
of your vocation." The young scholar did not 
expect such an advice : he was disconcerted, 
acknowledged his error, and promised to reform 
at once. On returning to Padua he embraced 
the ecclesiastical state, and spent his life in the 
greatest regularity. 

A great scandal then aflBicted the town of 
Brescia. It was caused by two men of quality, 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 53 



Philip de Sala, and Francis de Martinengue. 
For many years, these two Brescian nobles 
could not meet without mutual threats and in- 
sults. Often even they had to be separated, to 
prevent violence. In vain had mutual friends 
tried to reconcile them ; in vain had the Duke 
of Urbino, and the Governor of Brescia, offered 
their mediation to settle a dissension, the con- 
tinuance of which was a subject of alarm for 
both families : neither would admit that he was 
wrong, still less humble himself by yielding one 
jot of his pretensions. Every day men ex- 
pected some bloody collision between these two 
irreconcileable enemies. It was reserved to 
Angela to triumph by the ascendancy of her 
virtue, and by the power of her prayers, over 
so stubborn an enmity. No sooner was she in- 
formed of the scandal, than her zeal was in- 
flamed for the salvation of these two men, who 
were evidently so near their ruin. She had re- 
course to prayer, and fortified by the strength 
which holy communion gives, she repaired suc- 
cessively to the two rivals, who were both 
equally surprised to see her. Yet they re- 
ceived and heard her with the respect that vir- 
tue never fails to inspire. She was happy 
enough to induce them to consent to an inter- 
view: at an appointed hour they met at her 

5^ 



54 LIFE OP 



house; but by different ways, so as to avoid 
meeting. The holy mediatrix was pained to 
see them at first assail each other with all the 
heat that can be conceived in the excess of dis- 
ordered passion ; but far from appearing moved 
by this, she answered with such coolness, wis- 
dom, and ability, that the two enemies acknow- 
ledged themselves vanquished, and begged her 
to forget their temper. It was a sweet conso- 
lation for her to witness the kiss of peace which 
they exchanged, as a token of inviolable friend- 
ship. 

The whole city was impatient to know the re- 
sult of so extraordinary an interview. When 
they learned that Signers Sala and Martinengue 
were reconciled, it became for many days the 
absorbing topic of conversation. The report 
of it soon spread through the province, and 
reached even the court of Francis Sforza, the 
last Duke of Milan. This prince, touched by 
the many remarkable actions of hers, which 
were reported to him at the same time, wished 
to see the virgin of Brescia. He came in fact 
the next month to see her, but he had not the 
satisfaction of an interview, for she had just set 
out on her first pilgrimage to Mantua. 



SAl^'T ANGELA MERICI. 66 



CHAPTER II. 

Saint Angela makes a pilgrimage to Mantua — 
Prince Alloy sius Gonzaga — Her pilgrimage 
to the Holy Land — Loses her sight — Her cour- 
age in continuing her pilgrimage — She visits 
the holy places — Recovers her sight — Fearful 
tempest — pursued by corsairs — Reaches 
Venice. 

The venerable mother Hosanna Andreasj, of 
the third order of penance founded by Saint 
DominiCj^ had died at Mantua in 1505, in the 
odor of sanctity. Angela had known her by 
reputation, and had often commended herself to 
her prayers. She had consequently conceived 
a particular veneration for her memory. Hav- 
ing learned that many striking miracles were 
wrought at her tomb, she spoke of it to her 
host, who easily perceiving that she desired to 
make a pilgrimage to the spot, offered to lead 
her thither. It was, accordingly, in the course 
of the year 1522 that she beheld Mantua, with 
Eomano and some ladies who wished to accomp- 

* The autlior of a life of St. Angela, published at Fougeres 
in 1837, thinks that Mother Hosanna was still alive at the 
time of St. Angela's visit to Mantua ; we here follow the 
opinion of the Chronicles of the order of St. Ursula which 
places this journey at a later period in the Saint's life. 



].li 



66 LIFE OF 



any her. Immediately on her arrival, she hast- 
ened alone to the tomb of Blessed Hosanna and 
prostrated herself to kiss her precious remains. 
An hour passed over her thus, when her fellow- 
pilgrims came also to offer their prayers. The 
profound recolectedness of Mother Angela, 
moved them to tears ; joining their prayers to 
hers, they unceasingly praised the Almighty at 
the sight of the homage thus paid by a living 
Saint to the lifeless ashes of another. 

Meanwhile prince Aloysuis Gonzaga having 
learned that the celebrated penitent of Brescia 
was in Mantua, manifested a desire of knowing 
her, and begged her to pass through Solfarino 
where he then was. Angela honored his virtue 
too highly to refuse so honorable an invitation ; 
she accordingly proceeded to Solfarino after four 
days stay in Mantua. She was received with 
distinction and not permitted to seek any lodg- 
ings except in the palace. And the prince to 
show his signal esteem for her, condescended 
before her departure to grant her the pardon of 
a criminal who had just been condemned to ban- 
ishment. When she returned to Brescia her 
companions who had remained at Desenzano, 
earnestly entreated her to begin the foundation 
of her institute ; but she had far superior views ; 
it was not from men that she awaited assistance 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 67 



to take the work in hand, but rather from God ; 
who according to his promise was to aid her in 
the execution of the undertaking. Moreover 
the title of foundress alarmed her profound 
humility. She could not easily persuade her- 
self that God would make use of so feeble an 
instrument to accomplish so vast a design. Soon 
returning to herself and confused at having 
even for a moment doubted the power of the 
Sovereign master of all things. <^ No, Lord," 
she cried with the royal prophet, " I cannot 
doubt the truth of thy promises. In thee I have 
placed my confidence, I shall not be confounded." 
We may however infer that these perplexities 
suggested to her the idea of going to the Holy 
Land to visit the tomb of Our Lord. Her host 
who ardently desired this pilgrimage, used every 
persuasion to induce her to accompany him. 
This importunity induced her to think that it 
was in the designs of Heaven that she should 
undertake this perilous voyage ; that there par- 
haps she should acquire new light as to her vo- 
cation. She accordingly left Brescia on the first 
of June 1524 to repair in the first instance to 
Salo, where one of her kinsmen Bartholomew 
Brancozi awaited her. They took the road to 
Venice together, Romano proceeding thither 
by another route. In this celebrated city they 



58 LIFE OP 



had to await a wind favorable to sailing. Our 
pilgrims employed the time they were thus 
detained in visiting its superb churches and 
numerous monasteries. Their departure was 
finally fixed for Corpus Christi. In the morning 
all three received Holy Communion, and after 
putting themselves under the special protection 
of the Blessed Virgin they embarked with a 
great number of other travellers bound like them 
for the holy places. 

They crossed the Adriatic sea without danger, 
and the vessel was cleaving her way under full 
sail through the Mediterranean. Everything 
seemed to announce a prosperous voyage. An- 
gela had just descried the port of Canea,^ when 
suddenly her eyes darkened, and at the very in- 
stant, she found herself struck with blindness. 
She uttered a loud cry, all gathered around to 
help her, and each but realized the fact that the 
pious pilgrim was totally bereft of the sense of 
sight. This sudden affliction seems the more 
extraordinary, as it was not preceded by any 

^ This is a strong town in the island of Candia, and then 
belonged to the Neuchans. The importance of the port 
has diminished since it fell into the hands of the Turks, 
because they have neglected it. The environs of the city 
are admirable. It is a succession of olive groves, fields, 
vineyards, gardens, and streams skirted by myrtles and 
rose-laurels. Canea is the second town in the island. 



SAINT ANGELA MEEICI. 59 



pain. What a trial for Angela, who had pro- 
mised herself so much happiness at the touching 
sight of the spots which our Saviour had sanc- 
tified by his miracles and his sufferings ! Would 
not such an accident naturally weaken her cou- 
rage, or disconcert her resolution ? Her guides 
represented to her the unavoidable diflSculty 
she would give, and the many dangers to which 
she would be exposed. They remarked to her 
that in a few days they could reach Venice, 
where remedies might be obtained and her re- 
covery effected. Angela listened with her usual 
candor, although she thought far differently. 
The hand of God which bore her up, and his 
love which gave her strength, raised her above 
all these human embarrassments. She convinced 
Romano and Biancozi that the accident which 
had just befallen her was only a trial that would 
ultimately lead to her sanctification ; and she 
induced them to share the courage which she 
herself felt; to trust in God, and continue under 
his auspices, the holy voyage on which they had 
embarked. ** I shall doubtless," she said, '* be 
deprived of the consolation of seeing with my 
bodily eyes the spots that my Saviour has hal- 
lowed, but as I tread the earth which witnessed 
his preaching, his miracles, his humiliation, and 
his death, I shall adore him, and thus see him 



60 LIFE OP 



with tho eyes of my mind. If I shall have much 
to suffer, my desire will be gratified ; my trou- 
bles will make me think more frequently, and 
more efficaciously, of the sufferings of my God. 
And if I must die, perhaps I shall have the glo- 
rious honor of offering the sacrifice of my life on 
the way, or on the summit of Calvary.'' 

These words, uttered with the earnestness 
that the grace with which saints are penetrated 
always gives, carried conviction to the hearts 
of her pious friends, and made them determined 
to go on confidently with their projected voyage 
to Palestine. The captain of the ship, and 
the passengers generally, shared Angela's opin- 
ion. There was not one who would not deem 
himself happy to risk all the perils of the sea 
in the society of the holy virgin. They made 
sail forthwith for the Holy Land, and the pas- 
sengers arrived there after a very pleasant 
voyage. 

No sooner had Angela touched the shore, 
than all beheld her prostrate herself in adora- 
tion, affectionately kissing the earth, and offer- 
ing humble thanksgiving to God. She proceeded 
to Jerusalem on foot, supported by her pilgrim's 
staff. 

They visited first the Garden of Olives, the 
solitary witness of the cruel sufferings and sighs 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 61 



of the God-man; Calvary, on whose summit he 
expired the holiest of victims ; and the Holy 
Sepulchre, which received the lifeless body of 
Jesus. For Angela, all was darkness in these 
localities, so well fitted to strike the beholder's 
eye, and awaken the sentiment of faith. Yet, 
as it was, the fervent virgin clung so ardently 
to the spot, her meditations were so profound, 
that she had in a manner to be forced from them. 
Calvary especially, Calvary, that heard the last 
words, and received the last sighs of Jesus ! 
Oh, who could express the lively emotions of 
that heavenly soul on the summit of Golgotha ! 
She wished to die of grief and love where love 
made Jesus die for her. Everything was an 
eloquent tongue, proclaiming the Saviour's 
charity ; every object which she approached, 
seemed to repeat his love for men. Here she 
heard him announcing to the Jews the good 
news which he had come to bear to earth. 
There she beheld with the eyes of faith, the 
multiplication of loaves in the desert. Further 
on, Thabor recalls the miracle of the Transfigu- 
ration. In fine, she visited those towns of Judea, 
amid which the Son of God so often restored 
health to the sick, life to the dead, or where an 
eager multitude came to gather 'the words of 
salvation that fell from his lips. 

6 



62 LIFE OP 



The state in which the Holy City then was, 
sullied by the profanation of the infidels, was 
a special subject of bitterness to her. *^ Why 
can I not, my God !'' she cried, ^' why can I 
not here melt in tears to wipe away these many 
crimes that thy love cannot yet arrest ; to ex- 
piate this ingratitude of which I feel myself as 
guilty as the rest of the human race." 

Thus did Angela, by the vivacity and ardor 
of her faith, supply for what she could not scan 
with her bodily eyes. So impassionedly did she 
pour fourth the sentiments of her heart at the 
several stations, that she inflamed with a kindred 
zeal all the pilgrims who heard her. Sometimes 
her sobs deprived her, for a moment, of the use 
of speech ; but soon recovering, she expressed 
so lovingly her gratitude to Jesus, and became 
suddenly so eloquent in speaking of the sublimest 
mysteries, that none could hear her without 
being deeply impressed. It is easy to conceive 
that these lofty inspirations contributed signally 
to her progress in perfection. God had inspired 
her with the idea of this voyage only to place 
her heart in a new state of love and grace. 
By this means he rendered her capable of suf- 
fering all things, and undertaking all things to 
advance his glory. It is Calvary which he has 
chosen to make her really strong. Thither he 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 63 



leads her by the hand to offer the sacrifice of her 
will like Isaac, and immolate herself in spirit as 
did the Saviour in reality. The cross was accord- 
ingly deeply imprinted on her heart. The cross 
will henceforward be her lot; it will become her 
life, her strength : and she will so love it, as to 
be unable thence to live except in suffering.'* 

Fain would Angela have spent the balance 
of her days at Jerusalem ; but her confidence in 
the promises of the Almighty, the engagements 
which she had contracted with her companions 
at Desenzano ; the courtesy due Romano and her 
kinsman Biancozi — all these considerations 
made her look upon a return to Brescia as indis- 
pensable. She accordingly left the holy city. 
After following for the last time from the early 
rays of morn, her Saviour^s footprints, she pro- 
ceeded on foot to the vessel, embarking with 
several persons of distinction, among the rest 
Paul of Apulia, chamberlain of Pope Clement 
VII. They had to anchor in one of the ports 
of the isle of Candia, to obtain provisions, and 
there they spent twenty four hours, taken up with 
examining and caulking the vessel. The holy 
pilgrim who seized every moment to devote to 
acts of piety, availed herself of this interval to 
be guided to a church, where a miraculous image 
of Jesus crucified was venerated. This visit 



64 LIFE OF 



having been proposed to Paul of Apulia and the 
other pilgrims, all wished to bear her company. 
God doubtless inspired this good resolution in 
order to have witnesses for the miracle which 
he vouchsafed to perform in behalf of his hand- 
maid. After prostrating herself before the cruci- 
j5x, our Saint seized with the spirit of God, asked 
for the first time the cure of her blindness. 
** Lord ! " she said, " if the use of ray eyes can be 
useful to thy glory and the salvation of my soul, 
vouchsafe to restore me to light. Yet thy holy 
will be done, not that of a wretched maiden who 
deserves none of thy benefits." The pilgrims, 
witnesses of this fervor, were edified and struck 
with admiration, yet without thinking of the 
prodigy actually wrought; when suddenly, An- 
gela exclaimed: ^^I have recovered my sight!" 
All having gathered around her to assure them- 
selves of the reality of the miracle, joined her 
in sincere thanksgiving to God. This striking 
prodigy would lead us to infer that our Lord 
depriving his pious spouse of the use of her eyes 
when she was desirous of seeing the Holy Land, 
had in her regard some secret design of his love, 
or trial or mercy. He doubtless wished blind 
faith to be the sole guide in Judea of her who 
had journeyed thither only in a generous spirit 
of faith. ^' Perhaps," says at this point, one of 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 65 



the authors of her Life, " perhaps God wished by 
depriving Angela of the great spectacle which 
her piety would have contemplated with so much 
happiness, to teach his faithful spouse that the 
best means of finding him was to seek him in 
herself, in the depths of her heart, in the soli- 
tude of recollectedness and love. 

All the travellers felt animated with blind 
confidence as they entered the vessel which was 
to waft them back to Venice. They felt assured 
that in the company of a woman so favored by 
heaven, they could not fail to arrive happily in 
that Italian peninsula, and that they would pass 
the Adriatic without running the dangers which 
were then so frequent. Two other vessels, which 
had arrived the day before, in all haste got un- 
der weigh to sail in company with the pilgrims. 

They could at last descry the Venetian coast, 
and the three vessels sailing confidently on, were 
about to enter the mouth of the gulf when, sud^ 
denly, so furious a tempest arose that the two 
vessels foundered in spite of the incredible efi*orts 
of the captains and crew. The pilgrim bark 
wrestled stoutly with the wild billows of the sea, 
but after nine days toil, all resigned themselves 
to die amid the angry waves. The passengers 
and crew were a prey to the most frightful con- 
sternation. Their cries of distress echoed over 

6* 



66 LIFE OP 



the waters, and were heard on the shore above 
the din of the tempest. The people flocked to 
the water^s edge to gaze on them in awe, unable 
as they were to aflford them any assistance. To 
crown the misfortune, the ship suddenly disap- 
peared, the spectators believed it buried in the 
waves; but a gust of wind, doubtless sent by 
Providence, had borne it with incredible veloci- 
ty close on the shores of Barbary. Angela's 
desolation reached its height when she heard 
that she might fall with so many other Christians, 
into the hands of the Algerines, who were cer- 
tainly cruizing in those waters. During that 
long tempest she had ever kept her hands lifted 
up to heaven. This new danger more terrible 
than the preceding, did not lessen in aught her 
confidence in the Almighty. ^^ Vouchsafe, my 
God, to aid us,'' she cried, ** Thou who com- 
mandest the winds and the waves ; speak, and 
thy servants shall have nothing more to dread 
from the enemies of thy holy name." 

Meanwhile the pirates approached the vessel, 
now roughly handled by the bufi'eting of the sea. 
All on board believed themselves lost beyond 
all help. Angela alone continued to hope ; her 
confidence in God was not vain, for he had re- 
solved to reward the faith of his humble hand- 
maid. The infidels could not approach, and the 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 67 



vessel driven towards Venice by oars and by a 
favorable wind soon reached the desired haven 
The first care of the passengers was to repair 
to a church to offer their thanksgiving to God. 



CHAPTER 111. 

Angela\^ stay at Venice — She repairs to Rome — 
Jubilee of 1525 — Clemeny VIL welcomes her — 
Return to Brescia — Visit of the Duke of Mi- 
lan — She retires to Cremona during the war — 
Jl mortal malady brought on by her auster- 
ities — Her extraordinary recovery — Affairs of 
Italy. 

The ladies of the Abbey of the Holy Sepul- 
chre offered Saint Angela an asylum at Venice. 
Here she spent some time, rather to engage in 
pious exercises, than to recruit herself after 
the hardship and fatigue of so long and painful 
a voyage. But the report of the many won- 
ders that God had wrought in her behalf during 
her voyage to the Holy Land, soon spread 
through the town. The history of her whole 
life was recounted, and men spoke of the odor 
of sanctity which she diffused through the mon- 
astery which was showing her hospitality. Her 



68 LIFE OP 



conversation indeed was heavenly; her heroic 
mortifications and the admirable fervor with 
which she received daily, were a subject of edi- 
fication and a motive of encouragement for the 
wiiole community. Ere long, ladies of the high- 
est distinction expressed a desire to see her. 
The Abbess humbly remonstrated giving them 
to understand that Mother Angela was in a re- 
treat, and that it was her intention to receive 
no visits. But she had to yield to the importu- 
nate petitions of the crowd. Even Senators 
came to beg her to take up her abode at Venice, 
and as an inducement they offered her the direc- 
tion of two charitable institutions. Ever as 
modest as gracious in her refusals, Angela told 
them, while expressing her gratitude, that she 
would consult God to know his will in that re- 
gard. Soon after she set out privately for Bres- 
cia, with Romano and Biancozi, and arrived there 
on the 25th of November 1524, after six months 
absence. 

Her return caused unanimous joy in the city ; 
the people flocked from all parts to congratulate 
the pilgrims and especially Mother Angela. Each 
one pressed around her to learn in particular 
the circumstances that concerned her. The con- 
dor and simplicity of her account edified the 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 69 



whole society, and rendered the holy virsjin more 
venerated than ever. 

After staying sometime at Brescia, she wished 
to visit the capital of the Christian world to 
pray before the tomb of the Apostles, and vener- 
ate the relics of the countless martyers who shed 
their blood for the faith during the first ages of 
the Church. The consolations which had as it 
were inundated her soul in Judea, induced her 
to revere the spots where the Apostles had suf- 
fered ; in order thus to keep alive in her soul the 
zeal which had animated her, since she had med- 
itated, at Jerusalem, on the sufferings and death 
of the Saviour, ** I have breathed thy perfumes,^' 
said she with Saint Augustine, ^' they have be- 
come an attraction which makes me run and 
sigh after thee. Thy delights and thy caresses 
have dried up my soul and excited an ardent 
thirst. Thou hast touched me, Lord, and I 
burn with the desire of beholding thee, for my 
sole rest is in thee.'' Like the spouse, in the 
Canticles, Angela thought of her spouse, day and 
night. For after having sought him in the East, 
she went to the West, and ran in every direct- 
ion after the odor of his ointment. 

The sovereign Pontiff Clement VIL had pub- 
lished the bull of the Jubilee in 1525. All Italy 
prepared for a pilgrimage to Rome, and the 



70 LIFE OF 



highways were covered with strangers wending 
their way thither only to gain plenary indulg- 
ence. As soon as the season permitted it, our 
Saint set out with Romano her host, whose charity 
impelled him to attend her in all her journeys. 
It was a most sensible consolation for her to 
penetrate into that ancient Rome, once the cen- 
tre of idolatry, but become since the foundation 
of Christianity the see of unchanging truth. 
With admirable fervor Angela began to visit the 
tombs of the holy apostles and the churches des- 
ignated as stations for gaining the indulgence. 
God permitted her to meet Paul of Apulia, the 
Chamberlain of the Holy See, with w^hom she 
had returned from Jerusalem. He recognized 
her immediately, and as the position which he 
held, gave him ready access to the Holy Father, 
she obtained an audience through him. The 
pious chamberlain was charmed to find an oppor- 
tunity of obliging a Virgin of such eminent vir- 
tue. He had already informed the Sovereign 
Pontiff of the miracle which he had witnessed 
in the Isle of Candia, and of the extraordinary 
marks of virtue and grace that he had remarked 
in Angela. Clement VII. accordingly gave her 
a most gracious reception, admitted her to kiss 
his feet and gave her his benediction. In sub- 
sequent audiences he manifested his desire to 



SAI^^T ANGELA MERICI. 71 



have her fix her residence at Rome, where he 
proposed to place under her direction a house 
of hospital nuns. But she stated so candidly 
and simply the motives which induced her to 
return to Brescia, that he gave her permission 
to do so, promising her his special protection. 
It is easy to conceive how delighted Saint An- 
gela was to find herself thus known by a pontiff 
from whom she expected such success as she 
could' humanly expect, in the establishment of 
her- congregation. But she had scarcely return- 
ed to Brescia when she made another aquaint- 
ance that also afforded her great honor. 

We have alreadv seen that Francisco Sforza, 
the last Duke of Milan, had visited Brescia to 
see Mother Angela before her pilgrimage to 
Jerusalem, and that he had failed to see her as 
she was then at Mantua. The affairs of govern- 
ment having called him to the Brescian territ- 
ory in 1526, he remembered all that he had been 
told of the servant of God four years before. 
On arriving at Brescia he stopped at a Cister- 
cian monastery and intimated to Angela his 
desire of conversing with her. Touched by her 
profound humility, superior judgment and the 
wonderful facility with which she expressed her- 
self, the Duke received her with respect, and 
begged the assistance of her prayers for himself, 



72 LIFE OF 



his house and his dutchy. She promised to re- 
member them all ; but she took care to seize the 
opportunity thus offered of reminding him of 
his duty to himself and his subjects, portraying 
the dangers and miseries which are the natural 
sequels of vice, when the great especially give 
way to it. This conference did not last long, for 
Angela saluted the Duke, as soon as she per- 
ceived that he was satisfied with her visit. 

It was not without grave reasons that Fran- 
cisco Sforza thus begged the aid of heaven. 
Italy was then menaced by a bloody war. The 
troops of Charles V. had already entered his 
dutchy ; and in spite of the combined forces of 
France, England, Venice and the Papal States, 
there was every reason to fear that the Duke 
would not long maintain himself in his states. 

God employs various ways to lead his elect 
to perfection. The most ordinary paths are 
sufferings and humiliations repeated in a thou- 
sand different forms. Had not Our Lord him- 
self to struggle with the prejudices of his day? 
Most frequently too is he despised in his Saints. 
Their works produced by the eflScacity of his 
merits were almost always an object of contempt 
to the indifferent and unbelieving of their time. 
God wished it to be otherwise with regard to the 
Saint, whose actions we portray in this picture 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 73 



of her life. She was raised up to enlighten an 
indifferent age, when virtue was almost extinct, 
and piety at least despised among persons in the 
world; her mode of life quite unusual at that 
time, miglit naturally have been the object of 
ridicule from all classes. On the contrary, we 
behold her esteemed and sought. And although 
she studied to practise poverty especially, she 
was everywhere loved and admired. The more 
she endeavored to humble herself before God, 
and in the presence of men, the more God 
deigns to exalt her by the glory of the works 
which he makes her accomplish ; the more too 
men seek her and unite in extolling her virtues 
by their suffrages. 

Thus did Angela converse with fruit in the 
world, after the example of her divine Master, 
and it seems that the Providence which pre- 
pared her to become the foundress of an order of 
virgins destined to instruct youth, thus brought 
her into society, to enable her to be an ever 
subsisting model of the conduct in future times 
of her many daughters in their daily inter- 
course with the families which confided to them 
the education of their daughters. The apostle 
St. Paul says positively, that it is the good odor 
of Jesus Christ. Now intercourse with a soul 
whom grace has sanctified affords a charm to all 

7 



74 LIFE OP 



who enjoy it. Does not the mere presence of 
an eminently virtuous person suflBce to diffuse 
a kind of perfume through the foul air and 
corruption of society ? What happy effects may 
we not expect from her conversations, her wise 
counsels, all that is winning and even entrain- 
ant in her example? The love which Angela 
had for God, the ardent desire which she felt of 
seeking his glory, made her undertake a thou- 
sand works to reach this end. She would have 
wished like the Apostle to be anathema for her 
brethren : this was the source of that complai- 
sance and that heroic charity which led her to 
converse with all kinds of men ; accommodating 
herself to the capacity of one, conforming to 
the weakness of another, in order gradually to 
win them from the allurement of vice and fix them 
in the way of virtue. To all she gave coun- 
sels suited to their particular state, probing 
with a gentle and exercised hand the wounds of 
their conscience in order to apply the suitable 
remedies. All her duties were discharged with 
a charity of which no example had been seen 
till then. 

Meanwhile the states of Venice were not less 
menaced than the Milanese. The city of Bres- 
cia especially was filled with all the alarm that 
the horrors of war can inspire. The citizens 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 75 



had fled in crowds. Angela also alarmed at the 
approach of the German troops resolved to re- 
tire to Cremona. She was accompanied by Pen- 
tegoli and his wife, and by Romano, with whom 
she continued until peace was restored. 

This was a blow to our Saint, the more pain- 
ful to bear up under, as she thought the speedy 
establishment of her institute possible. Saint 
Ursula, the Virgin martyr, had appeared to her 
to encourage her design : and from that moment 
Angela resolved to give the name of Ursula to 
the religious congregation which should be erec- 
ted. But what prospect was there of her suc- 
ceeding in founding an order in a country then 
invaded by all the military forces of the empe- 
ror Charles V.? She had then to yield for a 
time to the imperious force of circumstances, 
and confine herself to seeking means for aver- 
ting the wrath of heaven. The illustrious pen- 
itent devoted herself to prayer in her oratory 
and in the churches, and fasted every day in 
the week except Sunday. The rigor of her ab- 
stinence was carried so far that she took but 
one single meal from Ascension to Whitsunday. 
Her body already attenuated by other mortifi- 
cations, could not bear up under such austeri- 
ties. A serious illness seized her and in a few 
days she was at the last extremity. The physi- 



76 LIFE OP 

cian having lost all hope of saving her, left her 
a prey to most exquisite pain. The holy viati- 
cum had been administered to her. Fortified 
by the strength which that sacrament never 
fails to give, she supported her sufferings with 
truly heroical constancy, still thinking of the 
promises which she had received from heaven. 
Every thing demonstrated that her soul enjoy- 
ed a perfect calm. '' Why/' she would say to the 
persons who surrounded her, ** why do you take 
such a human interest in my sufferings ? Did 
not Our Saviour endure the most cruel tortures 
to ransom us. I willingly make the sacrifice of 
my life if such are God's intentions. One thing 
alone is the cause of my fear, that is the rigor 
of his judgment, but I dare to hope that he will 
have mercy on me.'' 

Every one admired the resignation with which 
the pious invalid expressed these sublime sen- 
timents. 

Meanwhile the disorder grew rapidly worse. 
It was evident to all those that drew nigh that An- 
gela had but a breath of life. Signer Pentegoli 
summoned courage to declare to her that there 
was no longer any possible remedy, and that 
she should prepare for immediate death. ** Re- 
joice, Mother," he added, ''have patience a few 
moments more, and you will be put in possession 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 77 



of your heavenly country." These words were 
welcomed with a joy that we can conceive only 
in the absolute disengagement with which God 
inspires his Saints, when they are about to quit 
this life. Then the virgin of Desenzano seemed 
suddenly to revive, and with a loud voice testi- 
fy to the Lord how much she longed to go to 
heaven. So well did her words express divine 
love that they ravished all who heard her. But 
she soon after fell into a lethargy which was re- 
garded as a symptom and prelude of death; thej^ 
believed that her pure soul was about to leave" 
peacefully its mortal prison to soar towards the 
happy abode of immortality. On the contrary 
when she had continued some time in this species 
of agony; she suddenly rose up, asking in a loud 
voice for the Signoras Gallo and Pentegoli, and 
begged them to hand her her clothes. *' Ladies," 
she said, shedding a torrent of tears, " God lias 
healed me; I could see only afar off the Paradise 
for which I sighed, Our Lord has no doubt found 
me unworthy. Let us now hasten together to 
the Holy Sepulchre of Mount Varallo to give 
thanks to God for the restoration of my health." 
Thus it was that the Love of God, which had 
wounded cured her, according to the expression 
of the Holy Scripture : for the ardent desire 
which she had to serve her neighbour had made 

7^- 



78 LIFE OP 



her undertake austerities and works of pen- 
ance which led her to the verge of the grave : 
and the eagerness which she had shown to be 
dissolved and be united with God, and his 
heavenly hosts, was precisely what tore her from 
the arms of death which Love for God had made 
her desire. Death must yield to Love, says 
the spouse in the Canticles, for Love is stronger 
than death. 

Angela dressed without loss of time ; and faith- 
ful to the resolution which she had taken, she 
set out with the witnesses of the miracle which 
liad just been wrought. That very evening they 
reached Varallo. After spending three days 
there in prayer, she returned to Cremona full 
of confidence in God^s mercies and thoroughly 
convinced that he would soon set a term to the 
scourge of war. 

It was indeed time that it had ended, at least 
for the good of religion and the happiness of the 
nations. In fact the holy league, as it was called, 
had till then met with nought but reverses. The 
Constable of Bourbon, who had abandoned the 
cause of France to join the fortunes of Charles 
v., had laid seige to Rome in 1527. And although 
that able warrior fell in^he last assault; the cap- 
ital of the Christian world had been taken and 
pillaged. The Lutheran soldiers contained in 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 79 



the array had indulged in the most frightful ex- 
cesses during the two months that the pillage 
lasted.^ The Pope had shut himself up in the 
Castle of Saint Angelo to escape the fury of the 
enemy, was blockaded there, and at last wanted 
the very necessaries of life. In this painful sit- 
uation he spent six months and finally escaped 
from captivity only by disguising himself as a 
merchant, after allowing his beard to grow. He 
was flying from Italy to retire to France and 
put himself under the protection of Francis I., 
when he was arrested and compelled to accept 
such conditions as it pleased Charles V. to im- 
pose. This prince, intoxicated with his success, 
pretended that nothing should resist his power. 
Fear seized the cities of Italy at the mere rumor 
of the approach of his armies. Most of them 
preferred opening their gates to exposing them- 
selves to the miseries that had just fallen to the 
lot of Rome ; and to crown their misfortunes, the 

* The historians of the time relate that the Lutheran 
soldiers carried their impious mockery so far as to assume 
the insignia of the Sovereign Pontiff and the Cardinals ; then 
they formed a conclave in which they elected the heresiarch 
Luther, after degrading Pope Clement YIL The plague 
which before the close of the year broke out in the Imper* 
ial army, was regarded as a just chastisement of their un- 
told sacrileges and barbarities. 



80 LIFE OF 



French army commanded by Lautrec had been 
more than decimated by sickness. A new form 
of miseries broke the heart of all good Catholics, 
and especially afflicted that of Saint Angela: 
this was the poison of Lutheranism, which, un- 
der the cover of these troubles, had crept 
through Germany and many other States. Even 
Italy contained some of its proselytes. Yet 
God deigned to show his mercv to his unfortun- 
ate peopl(\. A treaty was signed at Cambray, 
between Francis I. and Charles V. in 1529, and 
the next year peace was concluded between the 
Empire, the Eepublic of Venice and the Duke 
of Milan. 



CHAPTER TV. 

Saint Jingela returns to Brescia — Her exsta- 
cies — She is endowed with the spirit of proph- 
ecy — She consults Dom Serafino di Bologna 
as to her Institute — She assembles twelve com- 
panions — Visits Milan — Founds her first 
house at Brescia — Apparition of Our Lord. 

For three years Angela had considered herself 
exiled at Cremona. The cessation of hostilities 
made her hasten her return to Brescia. Wish- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 81 



ing to lead a life more solitary even than she had 
before these occurrences, she renounced the gen- 
erous hospitality which Mark Anthony Romano 
had afforded lier. She took up her abode near 
the Church of the Cistercian monks in the par- 
ish of St. Clement. There she daily heard mass 
with a pious maiden whom she had chosen as her 
companion. There it was that one day assisting 
at the Holy Sacrifice, she was publicly rapt in 
exstacy, while she was meditating on the mys- 
tery of the Son of God immolated for the salva- 
tion of mankind. Her body remained raised up 
from the earth for a considerable period of time, 
and this prodigy was remarked by all those who 
were in the Church. On returning to herself, 
the poor penitent was extremely humbled to 
learn that all the people had witnessed so extra- 
ordinary a favor; and yet, this same exstatic 
state was repeated, shortly after, in another 
Church at Brescia. All in the city were soon 
acquainted with these miraculous events, they 
became the common topic of conversation. But 
the public astonishment increased singularly 
when they learned that to so many supernatural 
gifts God had added the knowledge of future 
things. After her return from Cremona, Angela 
had been visited by a great number of persons 
who congratulated her on her extraordinary re- 



82 LIFE OF 



CO very of health. Doctor Pracagno, her nephew 
came from Desenzano without notifying her. 
She knew that he was about to enter the house 
before he was announced. " Go open the door," 
she said, " my nephew has come to see me.'" 
From him she learned that two of her compan- 
ions were dead and that two others were about 
to return to their families at Salo. This infor- 
mation produced a lively impression on the ma- 
ternal heart of the holy foundress ; for she relied 
on these companions for the execution of her 
enterprise. To obtain consolation she prayed 
more fervently than ever, and God induced her 
to hope that she would soon be enabled to put 
her project in execution. 

In the same way she had a presentiment of the 
coming of another kinsman, a Canon of San 
Mazaro at Brescia. He was greatly surprised 
and could not approach her without respectful 
awe. But greater still was his admiration, when 
he saw his venerable relative, converse with him 
on his past life, and reveal to him the actual 
state of his soul. He could not conceal what 
had struck him so much in this interview. On 
his side Doctor Fracagno was not more discreet • 
so tliat the city and in fact the whole province 
resounded with accounts of these miraculous oc- 
currences. God, doubtless, had wished to verify 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 8 



Q 



in his humble hand-maid this prophecy of Joel : 
** It shall come to pass . ... that I shall pour 
forth my spirit on all men : your sons and your 
daughters shall prophesy. (Joel ii. 28.) We 
know that this grace was frequently accorded 
to the Saints. The spirit of God, which was in 
them, made them penetrate all things, render- 
ing them according to the expression of Saint 
Peter ^^ partakers of the divine nature^'' ( Peter 
i. 3.) Conformably to this doctrine the holy 
Council of Trent declares that the Holy Ghost 
resides in an especial manner in a soul which is 
enriched with the gifts of grace. It is thus that 
God displays his power in the Saints, who are 
the members of the mystical body of Christ. 
He uses them to procure His glory and accomp- 
lish his designs. Let us not then be astonished 
that Angela should see the absent and penetrate 
the most hidden secrets of the human heart. 
The spirit of God which possessed her, employed 
her to work great prodigies, convince men and 
then force them to avow that nothing is impos- 
sible to him who can do all things. 

We may also suppose, that God thus disposed 
minds to advance the accomplishment of the im* 
portant work, to which he destined his servant* 
She had reached the age of sixty years. Sup- 
ported by the high reputation which she had ac- 



84 LIFE OF 



quired, aided by the protection of the Sover- 
eign Pontiff and of several princes of Italy; 
sought by all the families of the country distin- 
guished by their virtues or the rank which they 
occupied ; it would seem that she might under- 
take any project, and that she should no longer 
deliberate on the establishment of her congre- 
gation. Incessantly alarmed nevertheless, by 
the difficulties, which, under a thousand differ- 
ent forms, assailed her mind, the humble virgin 
still hovered in uncertainty. For on the one 
hand she represented to herself her own weak- 
ness, and on the other, the order of God mani- 
fested in the vision of the miraculous ladder. 
She could not persuade herself that Providence 
wished to employ a poor maiden like herself for 
so remarkable a work. In spite of the desire 
which she felt, of extending God's glory, her 
will remained undecided. So deeply had hum- 
ility taken root in her heart that she durst not 
take her resolution. She opened her mind to 
Dom Serafino di Bologna, Canon Regular of 
St. John Lateran, who then directed her con- 
science ; and she informed him of the revelations 
which God had deigned to make her. This 
religious, at first, fearing some illusion, wished 
to take time in order to base his opinion with 
greater maturity. He studied in particular the 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 85 



vision of Desenzano, obtained a statement of the 
impressions which it had produced in his spirit- 
ual daughter, he then inquired into the dispo- 
sitions which God had infused in her heart, 
and subjected her to long trials. Both prayed 
much. Seeing at last that his penitent persisted 
in her humility and in her declarations, he no 
longer hesitated to decide that she should sub- 
mit to the orders of heaven, and engage with 
courage in the labors of so lofty an enterprise : 
that God having declared for it, there was reason 
to trust that he would remove all obstacles and 
surmount all diflSculties. 

Angela received this decision with perfect 
submission; and to show the profound respect 
which so enlightened a director had inspired 
her, she l^gan by associating with herself 
twelve ladies of Brescia;* but she at first pro- 
posed to these companions only a more retired 
life that they should lead in their several homes, 
with meetings to take place on appointed days. 
She wished thus to lead them gradually to take 

"^ These twelve Ladies most of them of noble families, 
who were the first bases of the Institute are cited in the 
Chronicles of the order of Saint Ursula. They were Simonna 
Borais, Catherine and Dominica Doleti, Dorozilla Zinetti, 
Pelerina Cazali, Clara Gafi"uri, Paula and Rose Peschiere, 
Barbara Fontani, Clara de Montenengue, Margaret de 
Lorme and Mary Bartolet. 

8 



86 LIFE OF 



part in tlie execution of her great design. It was 
to offer them to Our Lord and to present herself 
as a victim that she made a second pilgrimage to 
Mount Varallo in the month of August, 1532. 
Two days were devoted to this, during which the 
Mother and daughters were remarked for their 
modesty and ardent piety. In this mode she 
taught them the ways of prayer, and showed^ 
them the excellence of the spiritual life. They 
returned by the way of Milan, where Saint An- 
gela wished to venerate a celebrated relic. This 
washer only design ; she had no idea of seeing the 
Duke, and even supposed that he would be igno- 
rant of her arrival. But Francis Sforza, who had 
established an admirable police, had no sooner 
learned that his spiritual mother was in the 
city, than he made inquiries as to the spot where 
she was stopping and proceeded thither secretly 
to invite her to his palace. She promised him to 
go, and he received her the next day with every 
honor. The courtiers could not unravel the mo- 
tives that induced him to show such respect to 
a stranger whose costume and manners were so 
little in harmony with the usages of courts; the 
prince felt obliged to give a public explanation, 
and thenceforward, his household vied with each 
other in testifying their veneration for the aus- 
tere penitent of Brescia. Sforza earnestly de- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 87 



sired her to settle in his States, for since the 
peace of Cambray, he was more happy and power- 
ful than ever. He made her the proposition in 
the presence of her companions, during the meal 
which he offered them in common. Angela re- 
plied with that modesty so familiar to her, yet 
without making any definite promise. The Duke 
having become aware of her embarrassment, 
thought that he would be more successful in a 
private interview. In this conference he begged 
her to settle in Milan, promising her aid and 
encouragement in all the good works which she 
should see fit to undertake. So powerful, how 
ever, were our Saint's motives for declining, 
that the Prince felt he could no longer insist; 
but he begged her ever to be mindful of him in 
her prayers. 

A noble lady of Brescia, Isabella de Prata, 
filled with respect for the eminent virtues of the 
holy foundress, offered her a house which she 
owned near the Cathedral. Angela accepted 
it the more readily from its location in a sparsely 
inhabited section of the city, and from the lib- 
erty allowed her of altering the interior ar- 
rangements to suit her purpose. She first es- 
tablished an oratory, where she set up paint- 
ings to represent the various mysteries of Re- 
ligion. There the saint spent her days and 



88 LIFE OP 



nights in prayer to consult the Almiglity. 
** Thou knowest, my God," said she, '' that 
my desire is to labor for thy glory. I am thine 
alone : never, no never had I any thought but that 
of devoting myself solely to thy service." Tvro 
years elapsed before this timid solitary dared 
to speak openly of her projected institute. In 
vain did her wise director re-assure her as to 
an enterprise, which, in his opinion, could not 
but be pleasing to God. No motive had till 
fixed her resolution, nor overcome the extreme 
distrust which she felt in her own strength. 
God had to express his will again. 

One dark night, Angela knelt in her oratory, 
meditating alone. All at once, she perceived 
an angel approach her with a rod in his hand, 
raised to smite her. This prodigy seemed the 
more overwhelming to her, as our Lord had 
hitherto shown himself to her as a God full of 
sweetness. She felt annihilated by the glance 
of the heavenly Spirit. At once she fell pros- 
trate on her face in fear, silently awaiting the 
words that were to fall from the lips of the 
envoy of heaven. Having suddenly risen, de- 
spite herself, 0, still greater surprise and 
confusion! Our Saviour himself stood be- 
fore her, and addressed her the following 
severe reprimand. *' Where then is thy 



SAINT ANGELA MEEICI. 89 



faith,'^ he said, '' How, after so many striking 
evidences of my will, could you so long delay to 
found a religious order, the importance of which 
I revealed to thee. Wilt thou forever obstinate- 
ly refuse to contribute to my glory, and the good 
of my Church ? Must I accuse thee of a want of 
zeal and call in doubt the protestations of fidel- 
ity that thou hast made me." 

What can the poor virgin reply to this re- 
proach? At first she shed torrents of tears. 
" Vouchsafe, Lord,'' she then exclaimed, 
** vouchsafe to forget the negligence of my past 
life. Thy words have reached the very marrow 
of my bones, aud I am filled with intense pain. 
Unable now to doubt of thy designs in my re- 
gard, I wish to atone for my guilty delay, by 
the most complete submission, for from this day 
I begin to show Thee my regret, my zeal and 
my submission to thy holy will.'' 

At daybreak Angela hastened to the Church 

of St. John Lateran to relate to her director the 

new miracle which God had just wrought, and 

the promises which she had made him. She 

deplored, as so many grevious faults, the delay 

she had hitherto made in executing the work. 

She then received with greater fervor than ever ; 

and on returning home her first care was to 

draw up the plan of her Institute. A few days 

8# 



90 LIFE OP 



afterwards it was imparted to her companions, 
who all undertook to follow the rules. Sincere 
thanksgiving was paid to the Lord for this first 
benefit, which was regarded as a signal trait of 
his infinite goodness. But, in order to draw 
down still more abundant blessings on her and 
her sisters, she proposed to them to follow the 
exercises of a retreat together, in order to pre- 
pare like the apostles, to fulfil with fruit, the 
functions to which God deigned to call them : 
they consented with equal joy and eagerness. 

Thus did the holy foundress at last determine 
to carry out the will of heaven, and overcome 
the repugnance, which till then had checked her. 
A new aid of grace was needed for this step ; 
it shows us that it is not enough for God to give 
us good will, but he must moreover give our 
souls the power of action, by a new grace. Ac- 
cording to the sublime expression of Saint Paul, 
" It is God who worketh in you both to will and 
to accomplish, according to his good will." * 
Thus it is that a soul, otherwise very perfect, 
may know God's will, without immediately put- 
ing it in execution : so that, according to the 
Council of Trent, we must in all our christian 
works be prompted, accompanied and followed 
by grace, t So subjected is man to God's will that 
■^Phnipp. ii. 13; t Sess. vi. ch. 6. 



SAINT ANGELA MERIOI. 91 



he should wish nothing, do nothing, but with Him. 
Thence depend the happiness of the worker and 
the perfection of the work. For God blesses only 
what is according to his spirit, and according to 
the views of his Providence. Vain is it to plant 
or water, if he himself give not the increase. 



BOOK III. 
CHA.PTER I. 



Foundation of the order of St. Ursula — Its ob- 
jects and labors — Vocations of the new order 
— Its form — They are called the Divine Com- 
pany — First Chapter of the order — Virtues 
of the first Ursulines — Bides and Formulas 
— Directors and protectresses of the order — 
St. Angela wishes to resign the position of 
Superior — She seeks the approbation of the 
Holy See. 

On the 25th of November, 1535, Angela and 
her companions left the oratory where they had 
spent many days in the fervent exercises of a 
retreat. All felt animated with the noblest zeal; 
all had taken the generous resolve to devote 



92 LIFE OP 



every instant of their life to instruct the young, 
enlighten ignorant women and girls, visit and 
nurse the sick, console and encourage those 
whom poverty or bad example exposed to 
danger of ruin. The object of this first insti- 
tution was, therefore, to blend to the contem- 
plative life the labors of the active life. 

One would have thought of the Apostles issu- 
ing from the upper chamber after the descent 
of the Holy Ghost. The new community spreads 
over the city, and soon gathers around it a 
great number of girls ; they were especially the 
poor whom they took to instruct; the sisters 
were, moreover, to be found everywhere, in the 
hospitals, and even in the dungeons. This was 
to the people of Brescia a spectacle the more 
touching, as they had never witnessed such 
ardent charity. A month had scarcely elapsed 
when the foundress beheld herself at the head 
of seventy-two virgins, whom she applied her- 
self to form to the labors of her painful ministry. 
Such success in a city, till then so indifferent 
for the interests of heaven, no longer permitted 
a doubt but that the finger of God directed 
this enterprise; for these novices who had, 
for the most part, led a careless, worldly life, 
now felt inflamed with so sublime a fervor, 
that nothing arrested them in the pursuit of 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 93 



their apostolic labors. To such a point did 
their zeal go, that ere long, the spirit and 
charity which animated the primitive Chris- 
tians revived in the city of Brescia. 

In order to offer no obstacle to the sudden 
multiplicity of vocations, the foundress at first 
would form only a simple association, so that 
postulants and even professed did not leave 
their families : there they fulfilled a special min- 
istry, edifying all by their example, and con- 
firming them in the faith by their exhortations. 
Saint Angela wished to form in the midst of the 
world models of piety to form a barrier to the 
sad progress of the Lutheran heresy which then 
spread over Germany and threatened Italy. 
Sweden and many of the German States had 
already broken with the Holy See. Nay more, 
the king of England, Henry VIII., had declared 
himself the head of religion in his dominions, 
out of hatred to Paul III.i who opposed his di- 
vorce from Queen Catharine, his lawful spouse. 
Since the late war Italy swarmed with secret 
Lutherans, men well fitted to cause the great- 
est evils. Calvin in his turn had taught his 
errors in France. When expelled from that 
kingdom, he sought to establish himself at Gen- 
eva, and this was a dangerous neighbor for the 
Brescian territory and the neighboring cantons. 



94 LIFE OP 



There erroneous opinions in religious matters 
seemed to incline towards the pretended refor- 
mation. 

This plan formed with great wisdom was ap- 
proved by the ecclesiastical superiors. Like her 
they expected that in happier times, the associa- 
tion would tend to a higher perfection by lead- 
ing a community life. It w^ould have been nec- 
essary moreover to draw up at once constitutions 
which required a long and serious examination. 

Heaven had directed the intentions of the 
foundress in this initiation of so many virgins 
in the evangelical ministry. All were animated 
with the holiest emulation : each strove to mark 
the greatest devotedness to advance God's glory 
and her neighbor's salvation. Eulogies of the 
new association were heard from every lip ; 
such a reputation did it acquire from the outset 
at Brescia that the name of Divine or Holy 
company was given to it. The Bishop and the 
magistrates had approved the conferences held 
every Sunday in the common oratory : persons 
of quality frequently attended, and such was the 
success of these apostolic sisters, that all the 
faithful of the city soon formed only one heart 
and one soul. 

It was now necessary to give a form to the 
new congregation. The Sisters earnestly de- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 95 



sired it, and Mother Angela herself had de- 
ferred it only to try their zeal. A day of meeting 
was appointed to elect a superior and assign a 
name to the institute They resolved also to 
determine the respective obligations which it 
was necessary to impose on themselves in order 
to become more useful to their neighbors. 

Saint Angela having wished to spend in prayer 
the night preceeding this meeting, God threw 
her into a state of ecstacy, in which she saw 
Saint Ursula crowned with all the attributes of 
heavenly glory. Deeply touched by this new 
prodigy, she hastened to the church at day- 
break, communicated with redoubled fervor, 
commended herself to the Queen of heaven and 
earth, and after spending two hours in prayer, 
she returned full of confidence to the appointed 
spot, that is to say, to her oratory, whither all 
her sisters repaired also at the same time. 

The chapter was opened by the invocation 
of the Holy Ghost, and when Saint Angela had 
exposed to her sisters the important object of 
their meeting, she made them alternately give 
their suffrage, urging them above all things to 
consider the views of Providence, without any 
regard to her. Her surprise and her affliction 
were extreme, when she remarked that all voices 
were united in her favor. The sisters remarked 



96 LIFE OF 



to her that they had acted in this election ac- 
cording to the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, 
and that, from this motive, they were of opinion 
that she should assume the twofold title of 
foundress and superior. ^' Be then our common 
mother,'^ they added ; ^' we venture to hope too 
that the congregation will take your name. 
As to our general and particular obligations, 
dictate them yourself, and rest assured that you 
will ever find us respectful and docile daughters, 
punctually fulfilling your will. With a feeling 
of humility that had covered her with blushes, 
Angela replied that God alone having formed 
the establishment, all the glory should be re- 
ferred to him ; that for this reason she could 
not allow herself to be treated as the foundress. 
** Nor can I permit," she said, " that your order 
be known in the world by my name. I confine 
myself to accepting the post of superior, which 
in spite of my unworthiness you have confided 
to me. You shall be placed, my daughters, 
under a protection at once, more powerful and 
more honorable: you will take the name of 
Vrsulines or Daughters of Saint Ursula — of that 
illustrious virgin, who, by her instructions and 
sul^lime example, sanctified so many others. 
You must know that she deigned to appear to me 
all radiant with the marks of her glorious mar- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 97 



tyrdom. Take her then to be your patroness 
and mine. May we under her powerful pro- 
tection, solidly instruct the young, propagate 
the Catholic faith, and extirpate error and vice. 
Let us, like her, gain heaven by the purity of 
our minds and hearts, by our attachment to the 
Roman Church, and by our fidelity in fulfilling 
the engagements that we contract to God." 

It was also resolved in this assembly, that 
they should meet every Sunday to arrange the 
labors of the week ; examine and determine the 
proper places and persons for the exercise of 
their charity ; that to avoid all confusion, and 
to render their labors more useful, each one 
should take care of a different street or section. 
As to dress. Saint Angela permitted them to 
wear those they had worn till then, provided 
they were modest. She even believed that the 
ordinary dress, might, under their actual cir- 
cumstances, afford them a more easy access to 
the interior of families, and tend consequently 
to the dearest interests of religion. ^' Let us 
continue then, my sisters, '^ she resumed; '^let 
us continue the work thus happily begun. Aided 
by the help of his grace, let us go in the name 
of Our Lord, go whithersoever his interests 
cg-11 us, rendering ourselves in a manner the 
slaves of our brethren in order to work out 

9 



98 LIFE OF 



their salvation. Let us carefully direct our care 
to the most ignorant and the poorest. May we 
by our instructions and good example gain all 
hearts to God.'' 

The venerable mother spoke with so much 
unction and such a deep feeling of conviction, 
that her daughters never wearied of listening 
to her. All shared her opinion as to the name 
the congregation should bear. All, too, sponta- 
neously promised her the most entire obedience. 
Angela expressed the joy which she felt, and 
showed how sensibly she was affected by their 
confidence. She embraced them, and each one 
seized the opportunity to reiterate her protes- 
tations of obedience and attachment. 

When left alone in the oratory, the holy 
Foundress hastened to thank God for the happy 
result of this first chapter. And acknowledg- 
ing in her own weakness, the infinite power of 
the sovereign Master, she was but the more 
convinced of the intervention of his supreme 
protection in a foundation effected with so much 
care, and yet without any human means. The 
works of charity were pursued with still more 
ardor. Jealous of advancing God^s glory, these 
holy sisters often repeated these words of the 
Apostle, '*We are God's coadjutors."* 

* I Cor. iii, 9. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 99 



Whoever indeed serves God and co-operates 
in any good work, merits to partake of his re- 
compenses, and as God desires nothing so much 
as to communicate himself to man, so too there 
is nothing more advantageous to man than to 
devote himself to good works. 

Besides these consolations which the holy 
foundress enjoyed while accomplishing the holy 
mission which Providence had confided to her, 
she beheld with happiness all the members of 
the new order devote themselves to cultivate 
the most beautiful harmony. The little passions 
which glide so easily into the human heart, had 
no hold on these holy sisters. There was not 
one but deemed herself the last and most in- 
capable of all, so attentive were they to follow 
in this respect the model which God had given 
them by placing at their head so perfect a su- 
perior. On her side, their spiritual mother 
studied to treat them with the same charity. 
Never did the predilection which she felt im- 
pelled to grant to some, become a subject of 
affliction for the others. She had extraordinary 
tact in discerning and bringing out the least 
talent. She mingled so much grace and mild- 
ness with what she prescribed, and found so 
surely the path to the heart, that she always 
obtained the most perfect submission. 



100 LIFE OP 



So perfect a direction, and such a combination 
ot virtues could not but favor the increase of the 
Congregation of the Sisters of Saint Ursula. 
Accordingly the number of novices daily in- 
creased. It was on this occasion, that, by the 
advice of enlightened persons. Mother Angela 
compiled for her religious special rules of con- 
duct. A formula of promises for professions was 
at the same time drawn up, and the administra- 
tion from that moment assumed a character jBtted 
to maintain the sisters in the spirit and fervor of 
their vocation. The better to attain this end 
Saint Angela chose for her daughters the most 
accomplished doctors in the exercise of the 
spiritual life. They were Father Paul of Cre- 
mona, Canon of the Lateran, Dom Chrysanthus, 
Canon of St. Peter^s of Mount Olivet, and Dom 
Francis Alfranella, a man of eminent piety, who 
subsequently founded the Congregation of the 
Fathers of Peace. No sooner did he know 
Saint Angela, than he became extremely at- 
tached to her interests, and to the progress of 
the order of Saint Ursula. It was his wish that 
the congregation should be placed under the 
protection of eight ladies whose names have 
been preserved. They were Lucretia, Countess 
of Lodronne, Genevieve de Luzaga, Mary 
Devogrado, Veronica de Bazza, Ursula de 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 101 



Gavarda, Jane Dei Monte, Isabel de Praia, 
and Eleanora Pedezzora ; all animated with 
the noblest sentiments and belonging to the 
most illustrious houses in the city. After 
Saint Angela had confirmed them in virtue, 
and had infused into their hearts the spirit of 
zeal and charity which consumed her own, she 
bestowed on them the title of governesses of 
the order. From that moment they took an 
ever increasing interest in the prosperity of a 
society of which they considered themselves 
the temporal mothers. They labored with the 
foundress in the preparation of the constitu- 
tions, where all breathed the wisdom and mild- 
ness which made up Saint Angela's character. 
The spiritual counsels and the testament which 
are seen in the next chapter are in a measure 
the commentary of these constitutions. She 
there foresees even the changes which coming 
centuries might operate in her institute. 

All then was succeeding according to her 
heart's desire in the execution of her enter- 
prise. The number of novices constantly in- 
creased and the Congregation already embraced 
sisters of every rank, some of the very highest 
birth. One thing however was still wanting 
to ensure the perpetuity of the institute ; the 
constitutions had not yet received the approba- 



102 LIFE OF 



tion of the bishop of Brescia, Francis de Con- 
finaro, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church. A 
petition formed for this purpose was received by 
Lawrence Mutiero, who undertook in the absence 
of the prelate, then at Rome for affairs of the 
whole church, to examine the rules and consti- 
tutions of the new order, whose imminent services 
he daily appreciated. He approved them, and 
Cardinal Confinaro, who shortly after returned 
from Rome, also confirmed them. 

Meanwhile Saint Angela was advancing in 
life, and as her years multiplied, she felt the 
more the weight of the ofiBce of Superior im- 
posed upon her. Her infirmities seemed as a 
pretext for which to ask her dismission. She 
frequently conversed of it with her sisters, and 
it was at last resolved to hold a chapter for tlie 
election of a new superior. It took place on 
the appointed day. There Angela represented 
that her health no longer permitted her to con- 
tinue the exercise of the office confided to her; 
and in spite of the tears and supplications of 
her affectionate daughters, she persisted in 
giving in her resignation. All minds had be- 
come greatly agitated, but the bishop, informed 
of what was passing, suddenly appeared in the 
meeting. ^^ What! '^ said he to the Superior ; 
** would you then thus abandon a community 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. ' 10 



Q 



scarcely established, which you have com- 
menced, and which is supported only by the 
confidence due to you personally ? What has 
become of the solicitude and attachment W'hich 
you have hitherto shown ? Can you, without 
wounding your conscience, abandon an office 
which has become so dear to your daughters, 
and which you have filled only three years ? 
I wish you to retain it all your life to consoli- 
date the work which you have undertaken with 
so evidently providential success. In the name 
of God I command you to continue your func- 
tions as Superior.'' 

Saint Angela had laid down in the constitu- 
tions, that wherever the Ursulines should be 
established, they should be subject to the juris- 
diction of the bishops. She owed to succeeding 
ages a great example of submission to her own 
superior; she had then to submit, and did so at 
once, without offering any observation. On 
resuming the exercise of her duties, she devoted 
herself with a new zeal to discharge its painful 
functions, for the sake of religion, and for the 
spiritual progress of her daughters. This cir- 
cumstance seemed even to contribute to bind 
still more closely the knots that united her to 
the congregation. Ber num.erous daughters 
came to her oratory more assiduously than ever, 



104 LIFE OP 



to receive her instructions, and they showed 
an admirable docility and candor. Each re- 
ligious gave an account of her labors, and 
never undertook any without consulting the 
Superior. All left these interviews greatly 
consoled, and inflamed with a more holy ardor 
to seek their neighbor's salvation. God had 
communicated to his faithful servant a super- 
natural fire which animated those who entered 
into communication with her. Or rather, as 
one of the authors of her life expresses it: 
''Angela was amid her daughters like a sun 
which illumines them with its light, and like 
a furnace of love that set them, all on fire." It 
might have been said, in brief, that her words 
gave her companions a new life, and an incom- 
parable ardor for the completion of her work 
of regeneration. It may easily be conceived 
what fruits of salvation were the results of the 
evangelical ministry of so many fervent virgins, 
united now to the number of one hundred and 
fifty. 

This extraordinary increase of the congrega- 
tion, far from troubling the Superior's peace, 
on the contrary, increased her joy, for the 
daughters persevered in their first vocation. 
Each one of them consoled her, and gave her 
occasion to thank God for the success obtained 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 105 



by her ministry. So perfect an order of things 
sprang from the prudence with which the Al- 
mighty had endowed his humble handmaid. It 
was, in fact, in the exercise of this virtue, that 
she more evidently displayed the spirit of God 
which animated her. It will consequently ap- 
pear less surprising that her order had so happy 
a commencement, or was propagated with such 
prodigious rapidity. 

The Holy See had not yet confirmed the new 
Institute. It was feared that this defect would, 
sooner or later, embarrass its progress. Saint 
Angela felt her end approach, and those who were 
attached to her, also feared for its days. In 
this state of things, the ladies associated with 
her as governesses, urged her to solicit from 
the Court of Rome, a confirmation of the con- 
stitutions, which had already, as we have seen, 
obtained the approval of the bishop of the Dio- 
cese. She herself yielded to the suggestion the 
more willingly, as many of her daughters awaited 
only this occasion, to go and establish the order 
at her native town of Pesenzano, where all 
knew she so ardently longed to replace her old 
companions. But Providence had doubtless 
decreed that her mission should not exceed the 
limits of the territory of Brescia. She beheld 
only in the future, the progress that her be- 



It 



106 LIFE OP 



loved congregation of Ursulines was to make, 
and, which God, doubtless made known to her, 
as of old he showed to Moses from afar the land 
that he destined to his people. 

In spite of the extreme weakness of her con- 
stitution and the delicate state of her health, 
Mother Angela had never consented to retrench 
anything from her habitual fasts and austerities. 
She fell almost suddenly into a state of languor, 
which she considered as a forerunner of her 
death. In the early part of January, 1540, 
when she saw herself condemned to remain in 
her cell, she gathered around her the gover- 
nesses and officers of the association. " My 
career," she said, *'is drawing to its close, and 
ere long I must leave you. I have therefore 
resolved to address you some counsels which 
particularly concern you, and which I have had 
transcribed by my secretary, Gabriel Cozzano : 
he will read them to you. I have reason to 
hope that you will receive them with the indul- 
gence that you have ever shown, and even with 
the submission that you have never failed to 
testify." 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 107 



CHAPTER III. 

Counsels of Mother Angela to the Governesses 
and officers of the Order. ^ 

Angela, unworthy servant of Jesus Christ to 
her most beloved daughters and sisters, assist- 
ants and directresses of the Society of Saint 
Ursula. 

May the grace and power of the Holy Ghost 
be ever with you; may they aid you to bear 
your respective burthens; in order that you may 
merit the rewards which God reserves to those 
who remain faithful to him. Devote yourselves 
then unceasingly to the spiritual advancement 
of the chaste spouses of Christ, who are confided 
to your care. Watch over their preservation 
with a truly maternal solicitude. The enemy 
of salvation will often prowl around this dear 
flock to surprise and devour it : fear not this at- 
tack ; but have recourse to God ; implore his aid 

^ All the lives of Saint Angela that we have consulted 
close with the counsels and the testament which she left 
her Sisters. Thej are always the same in substance, but 
the text is more or less extended. We have combined 
these various versions, taking care never to depart from 
the thought. 



108 LIFE OF 



unceasingly, in order to put your flock in the 
way of salvation. I cannot too earnestly con- 
jure you to give this the greatest attention ; for 
the esteem you attach to this recommendation 
will be the measure of the love that you will 
show it ; and the purer and stronger your love 
is, the greater will be your care in preserving 
the treasure that God has confided to you. 
Reflect that it is through a most special grace 
that he has called you to the direction of his 
community ; fail not to thank him daily for so 
glorious a benefit and endeavour to correspond 
to the views of his Providence. Above all 
things beware of giving way to discouragement. 
Even should it happen that you think your- 
selves not possessed of all the qualities neces- 
sary in the exercise of your duties : God who 
has called you will not abandon you, and will 
if necessary extend to you a helping hand. Con- 
tent yourselves with doing what you can, and 
beg this God of goodness to add what you may 
seem to be wanting in. For my part I beg you 
by the passsion of Our Lord and by the merits 
of his Most Holy Mother, to receive with sub- 
mission the counsels which I am about to give 
you and to follow them strictly, never swerving 
from them in the least. They are dictated by 
the love I bear you, and they will be for the 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 109 



Institute, after my death, a perpetual token of 
mj^ affection. 

I. The first counsel which I have to give 
you, my beloved sisters, is to devote yourselves 
unceasingly to the practice of humility : to be 
thoroughly convinced that you lack essential 
virtues to exercise the functions of superiors or 
counsellors; that you are but unworthy servants 
of your companions; that you need as much as 
the last of them, to be guided and mastered; 
that moreover you are entitled to no preference 
over them. When, by a lawful choice, you are 
called to fill any ofiSce in the Congregation, en- 
deavor to make a good use of your authority, 
and seek distinction only in the humblest opin- 
ion of yourselves. Herein take as your model 
the Saviour of the world, who, God as he was, 
nevertheless repeated over and over, that he 
came not to command but to obey. *' Let him 
who is greatest among you," said he to his apos- 
tles, ** regard himself as the servant of alL" 
Never pride yourselves then on your merits or 
talents. Ah what have you, that you have not 
received from God ? He drew all things from 
nothing when he created the world : he did the 
same in giving you existence. You were no- 
thing and it was on this nothing that it pleased 
him to act, making something of you. It is really 

10 



110 LIFE OP 



wishing him to leave us and think no more of 
us, to dare to make any pretensions of our per- 
sonal qualities. We must of necessity annihi- 
late ourselves to merit our Creator's confidence. 
Do you wish to be ever agreeable to him? 
Never forget that you are only what he himself 
has made you : that you can do nothing except 
by his grace, and that nothing will succeed ex- 
cept so far as he deigns to give it his blessing. 
Such are, my sisters, the ideas that you should 
have of yourselves in the discharge of the most 
eminent posts ; you will thus merit that God 
should exalt you as much as you humble your- 
selves. 

II. Be afi*able and polite towards your religious. 
Whether they need exhortation or reproof let 
your words be constantly seasoned by mildness ; 
in order that they may feel convinced that you 
have spoken to them in a spirit of charity, and 
from your desire to see them advance in the 
ways of perfection. Rely, in general, much more 
on cordiality than in rigor. Prefer, as far as 
you possibly can, obliging manners, and resort 
to correction only when all other means fail ; 
and then only as the circumstances, the time and 
the character of the persons shall seem to re- 
quire it. Take charity as your guide in that as 
in all other things. This virtue which should 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. Ill 



constantly make you tend to act for God's greater 
glory and your neighbor's salvation, will enable 
you to appreciate the circumstances where it 
will become you to use mildness or severity. 

Among your daughters you may find timid 
dispositions, fearful and pusillanimous minds. 
Beware of intimidating them still more. Study 
on the contrary to console and re-assure them. 
Speak to them with kindness : induce them to 
put confidence in God, often repeating to them 
that his mercies are infinite. And far from keep- 
ing them in their sombre melancholy, endeavor 
rather to inspire them with a dt^cent gayety 
which cannot be incompatible with rue piety. 

If, on the other hand, it should L ppen that 
another sins by presumption ; inculcate in her 
a salutary fear of God's judgments. Make her 
feel the danger of having a heart inconstant in 
his service, and remind her that tepidity is a 
fearful state. Often warn her to be on her 
guard. Speak to her even at times with a kind 
of severity, and omit nothing to shield her from 
the snares spread by the enemy of salvation. 

III. Profess a perfect obedience to the sup- 
erior who shall be chosen to succeed me ; be 
equally submissive to the principal directresses. 
Carefully avoid following your own will, in the 
firm conviction that by obeying you shall have 



112 LIFE OP 



the two fold merit of yielding to my will, absent 
though I be, since you have chosen me in spite 
of my unworthiness, as your first superior ; but 
especially of yielding to the will of God, who is 
the first author of this Society. If it happen 
that your duties are incompatible with your sup- 
erior's orders, represent the matter to her hum- 
bly, yet always in deference to her prudence, 
that she may act as she shall deem proper. But 
be her determination what it may, show no 
chagrin, even if it is against your own opinion. 
By acting thus, you will never do anything that 
can diminish the merit of your obedience. Have 
an equal rr spect for all your sisters who have 
any authc rity over you, and inspire with the 
same seraments the young confided to your 
care. 

If the superior whom you shall elect corres- 
pond to the favorable idea which you had formed 
of her, return sincere thanks to God, and think 
how unworthy you are to receive such a favor 
from God. If, on the contrary, her manner of 
administering does not answer your expecta- 
tions, say in the presence of God you deserve a 
still more imperfect one ; this consideration will 
turn to the profit of your spiritual advancement. 
If however, you remark in her, any essential 
defect or if she should cause any disorder likely 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 113 



to scandalize your young scholars ; in that case 
you must notify the spiritual Father of the Con- 
gregation and humbly lay your troubles before 
him, in order that in his prudence he may pro- 
vide for them. 

IV. Keep an attentive watch over the conduct 
of your daughters, and make them render an ex- 
act account of their spiritual and temporal wants. 
Lavish on them all the assistance in your power, 
and if it should happen that you cannot succor 
them ; have recourse to your protectresses the 
temporal mothers. Frankly explain to them 
your indigence, withheld by no fear of appearing 
importunate. These requests will afford you 
opportunities of appreciating their kind hearted- 
ness and generosity. Yet should it happen that 
they cannot aid you, notwithstanding their good 
will, then exhort your daughters to confidence 
in God and entrust yourselves to his Providence. 
It is he who founded the Institute, and like a 
good father, he cannot be slow in coming to its 
aid. 

But if the temporal necessities of your daugh- 
ters require so great solicitude, what attention 
should you not pay to the welfare of their soul? 
Let them render you an account, especially on 
Sundays and holidays, of the progress which they 

make in virtue. Lead them forward unceasingly 

10* 



114 LIFE OP 



towards eternal good, inspiring them with a 
generous contempt for the things of earth. Let 
them understand well all the advantages of the 
holy state which they have embraced. Excite 
them also to persevere, and especially to behave 
at home as in the presence of the world, with 
due discretion, humility and modesty; so that 
they may everywhere appear the faithful ser- 
vants of Jesus Christ their divine model. 

V. The senses being, so to say, the gates of 
the soul, recommend with all earnestness to 
your daughters to apply themselves constantly 
to hold them in check. You will exhort them 
therefore to sobriety in drinking and eating, 
reminding them that food is intended to repair 
our strength, rather than to satisfy our sensual 
appetites. I say the same thing of sleep, in 
which we should indulge no longer than a suf- 
ficient and necessary repose requires. Habitu- 
ate them also to speak but rarely, for it is dij05- 
cult to speak much without being exposed to the 
dani>:er of committins; many faults. Endeavor 
to make edifying matters the object of your con- 
versation, and let due mildness and modesty be 
blended with it. Often advise them to exclude 
any topic likely to lead to a spirit of worldliness 
or independence. Let the Sisters finally remem- 
ber, that on entering the congregation they have 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 115 



renounced the hopes of the world and their own 
will. 

If they observe these things faithfully, they 
will easily support the contempt of the world, 
and will practise holy obedience in all humility ; 
they will courageously surmount all difficulties 
that can arise, either from their own families 
or from strangers : and God, who witnesses their 
combat, will not fail to aid and console them. 
Make your daughters especially appreciate the 
advantages of Christian union and charity which 
should constantly reign among them. Be care- 
ful that they all have the same rule of life; the 
same heart ; the same will ever conformed to 
that of Jesus Our Lord. Let them devote them- 
selves for his sake to observe the constitutions 
punctually, and be so rich in all virtues, that 
these words of Holy Scripture may be verified 
in them, *< We are the good odor of Christ.^' 

It may happen withal, that some will become 
discouraged: combine all ^our efforts then to 
maintain them in their pristine fervor. Show 
them how short is the labor here below, when 
compared with eternal repose. Draw a parallel 
between the sufferings of this world, and the 
immortal palms which God prepares for us. 
Convince them that they should place all their 
happiness in Jesus Christ, take refuge in him, 



116 LIFE OP 

take him as their model in all, and aspire to 
glory as the goal of their zeal and toil. 

Vl. Endeavor to live and behave so as to ed- 
ify your daughters. Never fail to practise your- 
selves vrhat you recommend to them ; for, your 
advice will have little weight, if there is room 
to remark in you the very faults that you pre- 
tend to correct in others. In vain would you 
try to maintain them in the ways of rectitude, 
if your precepts are not supported by the ascend- 
ency of your example. How, in fact, would you 
lead them to perfection, if you do not seek to 
attain it with them ? Be their models then in 
all things, especially in what concerns modesty 
in dress, innocence of heart, decency in action, 
the choice of good reading, the frequentation of 
the sacraments, the purity and brevity of con- 
versations, the frequent exercise of mental 
prayer, works of charity, fidelity to our rule, 
in fine, all the exercises of piety that most be- 
come the holy state that you have embraced. 

VIL Rest assured that you must exercise a 
constant vigilance over the flock confided to your 
care, to defend it from the attacks of wolves and 
robbers. I here distinguish two kinds of ene- 
mies equally dangerous ; there are vain persons 
of the world and false religious. You must warn 
your daughters never to become familiar with 



f 

■i 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 117 



secular women, still less with men, especially 
the young, versed as they may be, otherwise in 
spirituality. Experience but proves how dan- 
gerous these spiritual ties may become. Be 
careful too that they do not converse too long 
with persons of their own sex who live in indo- 
lence, for the ordinary topic of conversation with 
such is the pleasures and vanities of the world. 
They would insensibly divert your daughters 
from purity, rob them of the habit and inclina- 
tion of sobriety, and thus make them fall into 
remissness. Let them then in general avoid 
those, who under pretext of friendship or good 
counsel, would nevertheless be able to turn 
them aside from the virtues proper to their state ; 
but let them particularly forbear all intercourse 
with those whose faith is doubtful, for fear that 
error should penetrate to the very heart of our 
congregation. 

VIII. Love your daughters alike, for they 
are all children of God. It will often happen 
that those who at first have appeared less capa- 
ble to you, will become at last chosen vessels, 
the instruments of the greatest designs of Prov- 
idence. As we cannot penetrate the depths of 
hearts, we should not prefer or reject any. Not 
that you should accept without distinction all 
kinds of persons; but, at, least, great wisdom 



118 LIFE OF 



should here be used, for it would be dangerous 
for the general good to be deceived in so im- 
portant a choice. Beware then of judging rashly * 
these faithful servants of a God, who as he him- 
self affirms, can from the very stones raise up 
children to Abraham. Can he not also raise to 
the highest perfection, the apparently most con- 
temptible of his creatures? Exercise then the 
greatest indulgence towards them ; and when 
they happen to fail in any thing, rebuke them 
mildly, correct them with charity, assist them in 
fine, as much as you can, never swerving from 
these great obligations and persuading your- 
selves that heaven will not fail to do the rest. 

IX. The last thing which I have to say to you; 
and which I earnestly commend to you from the 
bottom of my heart, is to live always in the most 
perfect harmony, forming only one heart and 
one soul. Display all your care in drawing 
more closely the bonds of charity. Love each 
other with a reciprocal love and bear with each 
other for the love of Christ, who will live in 
you, if you live in him and for him. I leave you 
under the high protection of his holy Mother, 
under that of the holy angels, the holy apostles 
and the heavenly court. Love one another ; I 
repeat it, be inseparably united in Our Lord. 
This is the only means of resisting all tempests, 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 119 



of braving the efforts of hell. Farewell, my 
sisters farewell : for I know that I have but lit- 
tle time to live. I leave you to God's Provi- 
dence ; put your confidence in him fully con- 
vinced that he will act with you in your holy 
enterprises, that he will second your pious de- 
signs. From him I bless you in the name of the 
Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. 

Divine wisdom had dictated these counsels. 
Saint Angela had expressed them in the most 
concise and edifying terms. Her daughters and 
the lady governesses felt at this moment the most 
profound impressions of respect, admiration and 
grief. 



CHAPTER IV. 

Hopes of St, Angela's recovery — She makes her 
will — Appoints the Countess Lucretia Lodron- 
ne her successor — Her last words- — Her holy 
death — General veneration for her sanctity. 

Hope now suddenlv dawned in the minds 
of the Ursulines breaking through the dark 
thoughts that had enveloped their minds, for 
Saint Angela had sat up in her bed of pain to 
listen to the perusal of the last counsels which 
she gave the officers and directresses of the or- 



120 LIFE OF 



der, determined to repeat them, which she did 
in so firm a voice, that, although she announced 
her last end, they could not persuade them- 
selves, that this malady was to be her last. Her 
loving daughters left her then, after testifying 
their gratitude, feeling the more assured a^ to 
her condition, inasmuch as the physician also 
agreed that there was every ground for hope. 

Saint Angela did not share this opinion, al- 
though the remedies appeared to afford her 
some relief ; she wished to make her spiritual 
will which she also dictated to her secretary. 
Meanwhile the Countess of Lodronne and the 
other lady governesses who visited her daily 
could not realise the fact that the disease was 
making rapid progress. They were not alittlo 
surprised to learn, that their Mother, feeling 
worse, summoned them to her side. It was in 
this conference that she declared it to be her 
will, that on her death Lucretia, Countess of 
Lodronne, should succeed her as Superior. All 
promised it shedding tears. Lucretia herself 
could not resist the repeated entreaties of the 
foundress who at the same time handed her her 
will, begging her to make known the contents 
to her daughters after her obsequies. ** They 
will now more than ever,'' she added, '^ need 
your counsel and your example. Continue to 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 121 



show them the goodness that you have thus far 
testified, treat them as your children and rest 
assured that heaven which so visibly protects 
our Society will bless it still more. Be tran- 
quil as to my situation which seems to alarm 
you. Take care that my daughters continue 
the exercise of their functions. Be pleased also 
to tell Signora Catharine Meja from this day 
forth join in maintaining order. I have chosen 
her to succeed Lucre tia in the office of govern- 
ess. You know her piety. I have received her 
promises, and am persuaded that she will use 
every effort for the prosperity of the congrega- 
tion." 

Angela was too universally respected for her 
intentions to be overlooked. Every religious 
went that day to their ordinary occupations: they 
felt the more assured because they heard towards 
evening that she sent those in attendance on her 
to hear the usual sermon. She had had her views 
in taking these precautions ; knowing that it was 
usual to wash the body before interring it, this 
ceremony, respectful as it was, alarmed her mod- 
esty, and she resolved to render to herself this 
duty to spare her virginal body the shame of 
being uncovered, even after death. 

No sooner was she alone, than without a mo- 
ment's loss of time, she rallied all her strength, 



122 LIFE OP 



got out of bed and in a little while executed her 
strange resolution. So well were her measures 
taken to conceal from all human knowledge this 
trait of heroism, that no one could have been 
aware of it without a special attention of heaven, 
decreeing doubtless, that it should be unveiled 
to add to the glory of the humble Virgin. 

The preacher was going to close his discourse, 
when he suddenly felt seized by a divine inspi- 
ration; he commended Mother Angela to the 
prayers of his auditors, announcing that her last 
moment was at hand. Several persons immed- 
iately left the Church to hasten to her bedside. 
One of her nephews was the first who arrived. 
His aunt seemed surprised ; but he was perfectly 
amazed to find her dressing. ^' God be praised,'' 
said he, **you do not seem to me so bad as the 
preacher has just announced." — ** Yet he spoke 
truly,'' she rejoined, '' for I expect to go forth to 
meet Our Lord this night." She was still speak- 
ing when her attendants and a great number of 
ladies entering, she asked to be put back in bed. 
The physician who arrived almost at the same 
time, was not long in perceiving that the weak- 
ness was extraordinary, and deeming all further 
hope baseless, he spoke openly. " I had told 
you, sir," she replied, *^ that this was to be my 
last illness: you now speak without disguise, 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 123 



and I thank you : for this news is most consol- 
ing, to me, too happy to behold the moment come 
that is to unite me to my Creator for all etern- 
ity.'' The humble virgin of the Lord had already 
asked for Holy Viaticum. It is easy to com- 
prehend, by all that we have said as to her ten- 
der piety, with what fervor she received the last 
sacraments. After this solemn act of religion, 
she besought her daughters to remain a moment 
by her. ** As my strength still permits it," said 
she, ** I cannot at this moment, refuse you some 
words of edification. You see me then, dear 
daughters, about to leave this earth to enter 
heaven, where I hope I am awaited by the chaste 
Spouse of our souls. You know what he has 
done for us. Be faithful to him to the last ex- 
tremity, conceive a salutary fear of his judg- 
ments, accomplish our holy rules with punctual- 
ity; preserve, above all, humility and obedience, 
and maintain perfect union among yourselves. 
Live like the wise virgins in the Gospel, this is 
the surest means of at last reclining at the mar- 
riage feast of the spotless lamb. God knows, 
my daughters, how often I have asked these 
graces for you. I feel a confidence that he will 
vouchsafe to grant them as a reward for my 
prayers and the zeal for your sanctification 
which has ever animated me. Yes, my dear 



124 LIFE OP 



daughters, I hope that the God of all goodness 
will regard the maternal tenderness which I have 
ever constantly borne you. It is in this quality 
of mother that you now claim my benediction. 

my Jesus, do thou thyself bless a Society of 
virgins so devoted to thee, grant that increas- 
ing in number, they may still more increase in 
grace, in fervor, in virtue, before Thee, and be- 
fore the eyes ofmen!" 

All present were plunged into the bitterest 
desolation. Nothing was heard but sobs and 
touching lamentations. The venerable found- 
ress, who felt her strength forsaking her, be- 
sought her sisters to withdraw and give her 
time to compose herself. Scarcely had they de- 
parted ; when Angela had herself attired in her 
habit of the third order of Saint Francis, wish- 
ing it to serve as her shroud. From that mo- 
ment her thoughts were but of heaven. She was 
heard to murmur acts of faith, hope and charity. 
" Yes, my God," she said, *^ I love thee, can I 
not at this last moment, love thee still more. 
Ye heavenly tribes, and thou especially holy 
Virgin, mother of pure love, inspire me with 
your sentiments, in order that I may love Jesus 
as thou lovest him I How long, my God, shall 

1 remain far from thee? — Who will give me 
the wings of a dove to fly to my Beloved ? ; : 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 125 



Break, Lord, the prison of this earthly body: 
deign to receive this soul which languishes far 
from thee ! " 

Thus did this happy soul elect, prepare for 
death. Her patience in suffering was admirable. 
While her features became unrecognizable, her 
soul preserved the same candor, the same tran- 
quillity. Slight convulsions being perceptible, 
her daughters were called in, and prostrate 
around her, they recited the prayers of the ago- 
nizing. But lo ! while they prayed, they sud- 
denly perceived a ray of light re-animating the 
features of the dying Saint. Her eyes lit up by 
this prodigy, shone with a supernatural splendor, 
and at the same time, a wonderous tranquillity, 
had succeeded the agitation, which a few mo- 
ments before, made her body and every nerve 
in it quiver. One would have supposed her in 
a state of contemplation, about to resume her 
strength and return to life. 

But the hour had come when the Lord was to 
crown his faithful hand-maid. She died calmly 
on the night of the 27-28 January, 1540, while 
pronouncing the holy name of Jesus. She was 
in the sixty-seventh year of her age, five years 
after founding her order. Thus soared to the 
bosom of God this earthly Angel who breathed 
but for Himc 

10* 



126 >LIFE OF 



The veneration entertained for her in the 
whole country increased when she had ceased 
to live. There was a general mourning in the 
dwellings of Brescia. The whole city talked 
of the loss which they had just experienced. 
The poor especially long regretted a mother who 
combined instruction with every succor that 
could tend to alleviate the weight of their 
misery. 

At the moment when they were preparing for 
her funeral, a dispute arose between the Canons 
of the Cathedral and those of Saint John Later- 
an. The former pretended that the right to 
inter Mother Angela belonged to them, as the^ 
oratory which had constituted her chief abode 
was in the precincts of their cloister. The others 
opposed it, on the ground that the Saint had ex- 
pired in a house to which she had retired more 
than a year before, and which lay in the parish of 
Saint Afra, within their jurisdiction. Both show- 
ed themselves extremely jealous of possessing so 
precious a treasure. This contest, moreover, 
which honored the parties, not being one to be 
decided at once, a sentence was obtained from 
the diocesan court, that the body should be tem- 
porarily deposited in one of the crypts of the 
church of Saint Afra. It remained there thirty 
days attired in the habit of the third order, the 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 127 



the face uncovered. It was afterwards seen 
that God had permitted this incident only to 
display more clearly his servant's glory; for two 
miracles soon confirmed the opinion entertained 
of her Sanctity. 

Many days elapsed without their remarking 
any sign of corruption in the body. Every limb 
preserved a perfect flexibility. The features 
of her countenance did not change. There all 
admired that serenity, that amiable candor that 
Saint Angela had ever had in her life-time. Far 
from exhaling any disagreeable odor, her gar- 
ments breathed a kind of perfume that inspired 
no less piety than admiration. ** Her body," says 
the bull of her Canonization, ^* which for thirty 
days remained unburied, preserved its flexi- 
bility with all the appearance of a living body." 

Another prodigy which took place at the same 
time, also made a lively impression on men's 
minds. For three consecutive nights, an extra- 
Ordinary light was observed in the middle re- 
gion of the air, hovering over the subterranean 
chapel where the body lay. The whole city 
witnessed this phenomenon. The faithful of all 
conditions began to bless heaven, and none 
doubted but that God had crowned her whom 
all so commonly styled Blessed. 

Meanwhile the litigation as to the place of 
her burial was actively carried on. On the pre- 



128 LIFE OF 



texts more or less plausible produced on either 
side, the official rendered a definitive sentence, 
by which he declared that the funeral of Angela 
Merici should be celebrated by the Canons of 
St. John Lateran, as parish priests of the church 
of Saint Afra which was her parish church, and 
that her body should be interred in a subter- 
ranean chapel. This judgment was sanctioned 
by the applause of the faithful. The next day 
they proceeded to the ceremony of her obsequies, 
which were performed with extraordinary pomp. 
Besides the numerous attendance of clergy, the 
nobility wished to take part in the solemnity, 
and the people flocked in not only from Brescia, 
but from JDesenzano, and all the neighboring 
parishes and towns. When the funeral service 
had closed, the body was conveyed to the sub- 
terranean chapel, and laid in the tomb which 
the daughters of Saint Ursula had opened on 
the right hand side of the Altar. It was so con- 
structed- that it could be opened to satisfy the 
piety of the faithful. Various inscriptions, 
given at length in the chronicles of the order, 
were engraved on a marble slab that covered 
the vault. They testify how great a venera- 
tion prevailed from the very first among the 
people for the lifeless remains of the illustrious 
virgin of Desenzano. 

They drew, in fact, a crowd of pilgrims who 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 129 



came from all parts of Italy. History speaks 
of a station made there by a pious ecclesiastic 
attended by a young stranger, who, at first, be- 
gan to read the inscriptions that had been en- 
graved on the sepulchral stone. His rich imag- 
ination was pleased with its elegance and happy 
turn of expression : but convinced that the auth- 
ors had, as is usual in epitaphs, recourse to 
exaggeration, he exclaimed to the ecclesiastic : 
** These are very pompous eulogiums, do you 
think that all this can be true ? " Scarcely had 
he uttered these words when he heard, twice 
successively, an extraordinary noise proceeding 
from the tomb, a noise that echoed through the 
church above. One of the religious, who was at 
that moment reciting his breviary there, descend- 
ed into the crypt immediately, and finding the 
two pilgrims near the tomb, he asked them in 
alarm what was the cause of the noise which 
he had just heard. "It was I," said the youth- 
ful stranger, in an accent that showed the live- 
liest emotion, *' my incredulity caused the noise 
that reached your ears.'' At the same time he 
prostrated himself before the sepulchre, bursting 
forth into tears and thanking God for having, 
while punishing him, infused such light into hig 
Boul. On leaving the church, he everywhere 
related the miraculous event which was soon 
known through the whole province. 



130 LIFE OP 



BOOK IV. 



CHAPTER I. 

Consternation of the TJrsulines after the death 
of Saint Angela — The Countess of Lodronne^ 
second superior of the order j reads publicly 
the will of Saint Angela — The provisions of 
this Testament. 

The death of Saint Angela had plunged her 
daughters in discouragement and consternation. 
They considered themselves a flock without a 
shepherd ; and while the whole Heavenly Court 
welcomed her to the abode of glory, confusion 
had taken the place of order in the bosom of 
the Society which she had founded. The exer- 
cises of the classes and the other functions of the 
Institute, were interrupted during these days of 
grief No one felt courage to meet the rest, 
and continue the labors to which they had been 
habituated for years. Providence designed how- 
ever to perpetuate this congregation, and would 
not suffer it to expire thus in its cradle. The 
wise Countess of Lodronne, whom Saint Angela 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 131 



had named as her successor, put an end to this 
state of things ; she invited the sisters to meet, 
and agreed with them on a day, when a chapter 
should be had to consider the actual state 
of the Institute. The voice of so eminent a 
lady was hearkened to by all the sisters ; they 
came forth as from a profound sleep. They felt 
that God would not leave them orphans. Hav- 
ing corresponded cordially to this appeal, they 
were addressed by the Countess as follows, in 
presence of the other governesses of the order. 
" We have just, my sisters, sustained a great 
loss, which I feel more intensely than any other, 
on account of the close bonds which united me 
to our common Mother. Yet we cannot any 
longer, without becoming guilty, continue to 
mourn and lament. God wished to call to him 
a soul that was his. No more, alas, shall we 
behold that tender mother preside at our meet- 
ings. No more shall we enjoy those touching 
instructions, which charming our minds, ani- 
mated us with the liveliest zeal. Let us be con- 
soled however, my Sisters, for she who is no 
longer wdth us here below, lives in heaven to 
protect us. What do I say ? she will live forever 
on earth by the example which she has left, by 
the sublime lessons which she has given, by the 
counsels which she addressed to us especially, 



132 LIFE OF 



and still more by her spiritual testament, des- 
tined to remind her daughters constantly, of the 
duties of their holy state, and the tender solici- 
tude which she evinced for them till her death. 
Behold, my dear Sisters, .this precious gift, just 
as she confided it to me, exacting a promise on 
my part not to make it known till after her bur- 
ial. The time has come to fulfil this engage- 
ment, and for this reason I have begged you to 
assemble here. It is necessary also to know 
what steps you will follow under the circum- 
stances in which this advent has placed you. 
Listen then to your mother, she will impart to 
you her last will. May we, all engrave them 
deep in our hearts." After this consoling dis- 
course Lucretia called in Gabriel Corzano, the 
secretary of the holy foundress, and placed in 
his hands the will which he read aloud as fol- 
lows: 

Testament of Angela Merici unworthy servant 
of Christ. 

** I, Sister Angela, unworthy servant of 
Christ. May Almighty God grant you his eter- 
nal benediction, especially to you noble Countess 
Lucretia de Lodronne, principal mother of the 
Society of Saint Ursula ; and to you illustrious 
ladies, Genevieve de Luzaga, Mary Davogrado, 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 133 



Veronica do Buzza, Ursula de Gavarda, Jane 
del Monte, Isabel de Prata, Eleanora de Pedez- 
zora and Catharine Meja. In the name of the 
Father, and of the Son, and of the Holj^ Ghost. 

*^ God has wished, mv dear Mother and Sisters 
to withdraw from the vanities of the world, a 
great number of pious women and particularly 
the young virgins of our congregation. What 
leads me to admire in this especially, his infinite 
mercy, is that he has designed to employ me, 
unworthy as I am, to be his instrument in the 
execution of so great a design. To his incom- 
parable bounty do I owe the light and graces 
wherewith I was favored, and which I needed 
for the accomplishment of his adorable will. 
He has made use of me to provide for all your 
wants, and especially for the spiritual aid which 
I desired to afford you to confirm you in the holy 
state to which you have been called. 

But one of the most essential graces that I 
have received of him, is to have inspired you 
with the generous project of seconding me. No 
one was worthier than you to be the spiritual 
mothers of our institute, I was not deceived iu 
my expectations, for not only have you adopted 
this family, now precious before God, but you 
cherish all the members, as so many children of 
your own. Consider then, I pray you, consider 

12 



134 LIFE OP 



the nobility of your vocation, how honorable 
it is for you to have been chosen by God him- 
self to direct so many virgins, chaste spouses of 
Christ. But the more this preference requires 
you to render him the sincerest thanksgiving, 
the more should you pray Him to enable you to 
consummate a work so well begun. Abandon 
yourselves then generously to Him, put a bound- 
less confidence in Him, prepare to support every 
event for his love and with a submission that 
nothing can shake. I conjure you, especially in 
the name of Jesus Christ, and by the merits of 
his bitter passion, to practise exactly the salu- 
tary counsels that I am about to give you. 
These are the last wills that he has inspired me 
with for his glory and your advantage. Re- 
gard them as so many spiritual legacies which I 
make out of attachment to you, and which I 
leave you as a most precious inheritance. Such 
are the last proofs of ray love for you ; I recom- 
mend, by all that you hold dearest, the execu- 
tion of this my last will. 

*' I. Legacy. I ask my dear Mother and Sisters 
in Christ, that your intentions in the accomplish- 
ment of your duties, be so pure, that you ex- 
clude every other object in your actions, but 
God's glory and the salvation of souls. Your 
works will then flow from charity as their prin- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 135 



ciple, and will necessarily produce happy fruit. 
For as Our Lord says expressly, the good tree, 
that is, the heart, inflamed with the sweet flames 
of charity, can bear only holy works, fruits of life. 

*' II. Legacy. Be careful to engrave deeply in 
your memory not only the name and condition 
of your daughters, but also their natural quali- 
ties and disposition. If you really love them, 
this study will not be difficult ; for experience 
daily teaches us that natural mothers are con- 
stantly occupied with their children ; that they 
keep them ever in their mind. Their solicitude 
increases in proportion to the number who are 
to share it. The care of spiritual mothers, should 
be still more continual, inasmuch as the bonds 
of charity are more perfect than those of blood. 
Love your daughters then, my dearest mothers, 
treat them with that gentleness and humility of 
heart which our Saviour so earnestly recommend- 
ed by word and by example. Does He not also 
assure us that his yoke is sweet and his burden 
light ? 

'' III. Legacy. Conduct your daughters with 
mildness and moderation ; let rigor and severe 
measures be unknown among you. Keep ever 
before your mind the characteristics of charity 
which are patience, benignity, modesty, affa- 
bility, beneficence. Our divine Master was meek 



136 LIFE OP 



and humble of heart, and Providence governs 
men and directs events only with moderation. 
Make these maxims the rule of your conduct. 
Yet do not imagine that I wish to proscribe the 
lawful use of your authority ; for should one of 
your daughters abuse this gentle government 
and deserve reproach, then it will be your duty 
to employ severe measures, proportioning them 
to the places, condition and quality of the per- 
son ; provided that zeal and charity be ever the 
rule and source. 

•'-IV. Legacy, Be careful, dear Mothers, to 
inspire your daughters with the courage which 
they will need to practise the virtues, without 
which they cannot please Christ, whom in their 
religious profession, they took for their spouse. 
Let them above all, devote their attention to the 
observance of the duties of the most perfect pur- 
ity. Take care that their manners be decent 
and ordered with propriety. Consider your- 
selves here too as ordinary mothers, take them 
as models ; you will notice how they strive to 
give their daughters an education best suited to 
their state. They form them to the tone and 
manners of the world, that they may assume the 
rank which they are intended to occupy. They 
glory in rearing them well, and make it a merit 
among men. So, dear Mothers, should you act 



/ 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 137 



with your spiritual daughters. They are not des- 
tined, indeed, to please the world, but the eter- 
nal Son of God intends them as his spouses, and 
he it is who has committed to you the care of 
rendering them so perfect as to be worthy of 
him. Think then, I repeat, of the greatness 
and nobility of your vocation. As Providence 
has placed you at the head of so many Virgins, 
devote all your care to form them for the King 
of kings. Your mission will be truly enviable, 
and laboring thus for God's glory you will be 
happy in this world and filled with glory for all 
eternity. 

** V. Legacy, Should any of your daughters un- 
happily fall into any considerable fault, warn 
her several times with a charity full of tender- 
ness and solicitude ; but if she remain insens- 
ible to your warnings, cease to speak to her for 
some time, abandoning her in some sort to her- 
self, and letting her understand that she no 
longer belongs to the community. If you take 
care to make her feel this kind of abandonment 
sensibly, it will often happen, that given up thus 
to herself, she will make wholesome reflections, 
that will lead her to repent of her faults, and 
will excite a new fervor in her. When she re- 
turns you will welcome her with goodness. She 
will repair, in presence of her fellow sisters, the 

12* 



138 LIFE OP 



scandal caused ; she shall ask pardon in private 
of the mother directresses appointed to warn 
her. She will submit, besides, to the penance 
which the spiritual father of the house shall im- 
pose, that is to saj, to fast one Friday on bread 
and water. 

*' VI. Legacy. Should you perceive that any 
one of the younger sisters preserves too much 
attachment to the vanities of the world, or other 
trifles, which especially in a religious are real 
follies ; do not conceive any great hopes of her. 
Presume on the contrary, that she will have 
great diflSculty in persevering in her vocation. 
If she refuses, in fact, to accept slight sacrifices, 
how could she habituate herself to make greater 
ones every day in the religious state. Yet 
treat her with great prudence and charity : for 
these are temptations, that God will give her 
grace to overcome, if she makes never so little 
effort to overcome herself; and when she once 
succeeds, she will be able with like success to 
surmount all other obstacles, and thus fulfil her 
duties with facility, perhaps even with more 
fruit for her salvation. 

'^ VII. Legacy. Never omit to meet at least 
once a month, in order to consult those in charge 
on the affairs of the congregation, to examine 
thoroughly the administration, and to receive 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 139 



an account of the conduct of all your daughters : 
as well as of their temporal and spiritual wants. 
These private meetings will be of incalculable 
service in enabling you to provide for every 
thing, as necessity, prudence, and the spirit of 
God shall inspire. 

" VIIL Legacy. Take care also to assemble 
all your daughters from time to time, to enable 
them to hear some instructions touching their 
duties. Choose for this a virtuous and enlight- 
ened priest ; who may by his exhortations and 
good example, cement the union that should 
reign among you ; consoling some, encouraging 
others to pursue the path of virtue and thus 
tend to perfection. For it is a great consola- 
tion for man, said Saint Ambrose, to have a 
trustworthy person to whom he can open his 
heart and communicate his secrets and his 
troubles. "I advise you then,^' adds this holy 
doctor, '' to choose a wise friend, who may felici- 
tate you in prosperity, console you in adversity, 
counsel you in perplexity." '' Nothing is more 
consoling," said Saint Augustine in like man- 
ner, " nothing is more consoling than the out- 
pouring of hearts between true friends; but 
there can be no slow friendship, no durable 
society unless cemented by charit3^" 

** IX. Legacy, God seems to have approved 



140 LIFE OF 



as useful our possessing some temporal goods, 
since Providence has already concurred in be- 
stowing them upon us. Administer these goods 
as real mothers, and put them to use so as to be 
useful to the increase of the community. It 
will devolve chiefly on you, illustrious Countess, 
to regulate all afl'airs of this nature. I confide 
them to your wisdom : but do nothing of import- 
ance, without taking the advice of the spiritual 
Father of the Society. In difficult cases con- 
sult also the protectors to whom I have con- 
fided the temporal interests, in order that your 
enterprises may not fail to be advantageous to 
your dear daughters : either to encourage those 
who have already entered the Congregation, or 
to stimulate others, whom God has inspired with 
the same vocation. 

" X. Legacy. The precept of alms is common 
to all Christians ; but is more especially obliga- 
tory on persons consecrated to God. Give alms 
then, dear Mothers, according to your means, 
and never fail to render your neighbor the ser- 
vices that may depend on you. The most direct 
pa>th that leads us to God is undoubtedly that 
of the works of mercy. It is also a very effica- 
cious means for recalling sinners, for very fre- 
quently only a good work is needed to preserve 
or withdraw a host of souls from vice or to lead 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 141 



a neighbor to a better life. Alms is a pious 
stratagem whereby we buy souls. Hereby we 
place the poor in a kind of necessity to labor 
for their salvation. Be faithful tlien to these 
principles, and with the aid of grace you will 
thus do much good. 

^' XI. Legacy. In the direction of your be- 
loved daughters, display all the vigilance and 
solicitude that the Divine Pastor of souls has 
a right to expect from you. Take care to afford 
them the apparently most trifling satisfaction : 
keep off from this faithful flock, all that can 
trouble its peace or happy harmony. You will 
thus prevent all kinds of discord ; you will fore- 
close all scandals. But watch especially, watch 
scrupulously, over their manner of thinking; in 
order to preserve them in the unhappy times 
of error in which we live, from every dangerous 
or- suspicious opinion in matters of faith. As 
you know, the enemy of salvation now prowls 
more than ever around the fold of the sovereign 
Shepherd. Wo to the imprudent sheep who 
expose themselves to fall into the snares of the 
demon of heresy. Give this your most untir- 
ing attention, and if jou do so, there will never 
be in our Institute but one faith, one will, one 
heart, as there was among the first Christians. 
If perfect unity of faith reigns among you, the 



142 LIFE OP 



purest charity and most happy understanding 
will be observed between you and your daugh- 
ters. What more efficacious means of securing 
to yourselves the protection of the Saviour of 
men ! Your mutual love will be a guarantee 
of the perpetuity of his grace and a sure pledge 
to him of your fidelity : ^' If you love one an- 
other," says he, *' the world shall know that 
you are my disciples." John xii. 

*^ XII. Legacy, Your fidelity to God therefore 
depends on your union among yourselves. Ob- 
serve the great precept of charity I conjure 
you. Be ever on your guard against the angel 
of darkness, who will infallibly seek to seduce 
you under specious pretexts and fine appear- 
ances. When then you perceive the least divi- 
sion, apply without delay the most efficacious 
remedies. Arrange for this purpose with the 
spiritual Father of the community, and then 
employ the useful means which heaven will not 
fail to inspire, as soon as you are assembled in 
his name. You will thus extirpate the evil by the 
root, and there will remain no leaven of discord 
among you, that pest of society, which would 
end by speedily producing the entire ruin of 
our Institute ; for as Our Saviour says : *' Every 
kingdom divided against itself shall fall." 

*' XIII. Legacy. 1 finally desire you, dear 



SAINT ANGEL .1 MERICI. 143 



Mothers and Sisters, to remain inviolably at- 
tached to what God's grace has inspired me to 
prescribe ; particularly all the points of the rule. 
Times and circumstances may arrive which will 
require some change. Make none without sage 
counsel and mature deliberation. Never forget 
to recur to Jesus in your necessities, and do so 
with implicit confidence. Often prostrate your- 
selves with vour daup-hters at the foot of the 
cross. Offer this divine spouso your prayers and 
tears. He himself will deign to console you, 
instruct you, and grant your vows. Since Provi- 
dence has deigned to protect this rising society ; 
rest assured that he will not forsake it, as long as 
its object is God's service and glory. 

^'Conclusion. If you remain faithful in the ob- 
servance of the instructions just given you, and 
if you follow the inspirations, that it will please 
the Lord to communicate to you according to 
your need, and the various circumstances in 
which you are placed, what joy will then reign 
among you ? what reward may you not expect ? 
What inexpressible consolation in fact to feel 
that we shall one day all live united in heaven ! 
Banish all sadness therefore from your hearts ; 
you need fear neither danger nor obstacles, be 
they what they may, as long as you can rely on 
Our Saviour's support. His grace will sustain 



144 LIFE OB 



you till your latest sigh. Put all your confi- 
dence in him : be inviolably attached to him : and 
receive, dear Mothers and Sisters, the kiss of 
peace which I give you. In the name of the 
Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost." 



CHAPTER 11. 

The address of the Countess Lucretia — Her elec- 
tion as Superior of the Society — Her piety and 
ability — Confirmation of the order hy Pope 
Paul III. in 1544 — The Ursulines assume a 
particular habit — Spread of the order — They 
acquire the church of St. Bridget — Death of 
the Countess. 

After reading the will of Saint Angela, the 
Countess Lucretia de Lodronne again addressed 
the assembled ladies and sisters. 

*' You can no longer," said she, *^ be ignorant 
of the last intentions of our venerable Mother. 
You have remarked that they concern me par- 
ticularly, as well as the Lady protectresses of 
our Institute : but they no less interest us on 
various subjects. Tell us now without any dis- 
guise, whether you are disposed to receive our 
services, and whether we can count on the con- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 145 



tinuance of yours. It would be useless for us 
to take in hand the reins of administration, if 
you think of presenting the slightest obstacle ; 
or if any one of you should refuse to enter into 
our views for your spiritual and temporal wel- 
fare. I have subscribed to those expressed by 
our foundress, onlv on the condition that vou do. 
The weight of the superiority is far beyond my 
strength. I recoil when I think of the duties 
it imposes on me, and I am convinced that any 
other of the lady protectresses is more fit than 
I to fill the ofiBce. Yet I will accept it for God's 
greater glory, if such are your intentions ; but 
I desire that your sufi'rages be unanimous, for 
on this concert depends the happiness and sta- 
bility of the congregation. You know my dear 
Sisters, that the world is full of evil spirits who 
labor for its destruction. If we remain firmly 
united, we shall disconcert these projects. Ex- 
amine then in God^s presence ; and then take 
such steps as shall seem most suited to your 
interests." 

The Countess, with the other lady protect- 
resses, then rose to leave the meeting, in order 
to give the sisters full liberty in offering their 
suffrages, but the sisters crowded around to pre- 
vent their going. ''AVhat do you mean V cried 
all these holy virgins. '' Can we stop to de- 

13 



146 LIFE OP 



liberate, when our holy foundress liorself has 
made the choice ? Have wo ever had any will 
but hers ? Yes, most illustrious countess, you 
shall be our superior and principal Mother. 
These virtuous ladies to whom we already owe 
so much, will surely aid you by their counsels. 
We confide entirely in their wisdom and yours, 
and are ready to obey whatever it shall please 
you to order. You will ever find in us submis- ^ 
sive and respectful children." 

The community could not take a better reso- 
lution. The Bishop of Brescia unhesitatingly 
ratified a choice which he believed marked by 
the seal of divine Providence. The noble 
countess united in fact all the qualities desirable 
for the continuance of Saint Angela's work. To 
eminent piety she added all that can contribute 
to form a noble character, and to a distinguished 
education, a remarkable talent for administration. 
She moreover enjoyed the highest consideration 
of the whole city. Her birth, her personal quali- 
ties and her fortune, had brought her into relation 
with neighboring princes. The veneration 
which she had conceived for Saint Angela could 
alone induce her to assume the oflBce of Superior. 
In its discharge she distinguished herself by 
the activity which she displayed in defending 
the congregation against seculars who made 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 147 



every effort to stifle it in its origin. Fathers 
endeavored to divert their daughters from the 
religious state which they had embraced ; but 
Lucretia soon discovered these little plots. En- 
couraged by the bishop and the magistrates, 
sustained by the ladies' governesses, and sure 
too of the good spirit which animated the great 
majority of the religious, she brought them all 
back to their first engagements, and maintained 
them in union, fervor and regularity. Anima- 
ted with a new zeal for their neighbors' salva- 
tion, they continued to visit prisoners, to console 
the poor, exhort sinners to repentance, and 
conduct public shools. It could scarcely be dis- 
cerned that they had changed their superior. 
The conferences on Christian doctrine were con- 
tinued, and every Sunday they assembled in 
Saint Angela's oratory to give an account of the 
labors of the week. 

Then it was the world itself began to do 
justice to the Congregation of Saint Ursula. 
Men ceased to assail a society of virgins who 
had in view only the public good. The harmony 
which reigned between them and their superior 
gained them universal good will. Lucretia 
had the consolation of receiving a great number 
of novices, and then it was that she thought of 
forming a new establishment at Desenzano. 



148 LIFE OF 



She wished to honor Saint Angela's birth place, 
and to replace her old associate in conformity 
with her own often repeated wishes. ) 

Before putting this project in execution, the | 
pious Countess wished to renew the petition j 
addressed by Saint Angela to the Holy See, for 
the confirmation of the institute. Gabriel Coz- 
zano had preserved all the documents: they 
were submitted to the examination of the Car- 
dinal Bishop of Brescia who forwarded them to 
Eome with a favorable recommendation. The 
chair of Peter was then occupied by Pope Paul 
III., who had just four years before, in 1540, ap- 
proved the society of Jesus, devoted to the in- 
struction of youth. He earnestly welcomed a 
petition relative to the foundation of an order 
nearly similar for the education of girls. The 
rule and constitutions drawn up by Saint An- 
gela, whom he had seen at Rome during the Ju- 
bilee of 1525, seemed to him impressed with 
a spirit of wisdom and forecast that excited his 
admiration. He attested the satisfaction which 
he felt to see arising, on the field of the Church, 
the spiritual vine which was to produce so many 
virgins to Jesus Christ ; and after deliberating 
on it with the Sacred College, the Head of the 
Church published on the 4th of June, 1544, a bull 
by which he confirmed the new order under the 



SAINT AN"GELA MERICI. 149 



name of the Company of Saint Ursula. He 
there declares that this society is canonically 
instituted, and grants to each Ursuline, present 
and future, a plenary indulgence on the day of 
their profession, and at the hour of death. It 
would be impossible to express the joy experi- 
enced by Lucretia on receiving this bull confirm- 
atory of her congregation. With her daughters 
she blessed heaven, and took this occasion to 
assemble them in order to confer on the necessity 
of assuming the religious habit ; but as this 
needed the concurrence of the ecclesiastical 
authority, nothing was decided in this first con- 
ference. Two years after, a decree was passed 
to regulate the costume which has been worn 
ever since, never having undergone more than 
unessential modification?. 

The pomp displayed on the ceremonies of 
giving the habit and making profession, were a 
subject of emulation for the postulants. God 
poured forth his blessings on the new order 
which increased considerably in the number of 
its professed. Then it was that they proceeded 
to disseminate the order through the neighbor- 
ing cities and parishes. 

The community continued to assemble in Saint 
Angela's oratory, which had been converted into 
a chapel J but this locality having become too 

13* 



150 LIFE OF 



small, they had to think of procuring a church. 
This was the last act of the Countess of Lo- 
dronne. She made arrangements with the bishop 
of Brescia to acquire the Church of Saint Bridget, 
of which the Ursulines took possession in the 
course of the year 1556. Here the community 
elected a new Superior in the presence of two 
ecclesiastics appointed for that purpose by the 
bishop. This pious prelate died in 1559, and was 
suceeded by the Kt. Rev. Dominic PoIIani, to 
whom the Ursulines were already under many ob- 
ligations. Immediately after taking possession 
of his See, he declared himself their protector, 
and confided the direction of the Society to Don 
Francis Cabrino d' Alfianello, who had just 
founded the congregation of Fathers of Peace. 
The respect that he preserved for Saint Angela 
gave him an interest in this new duty. He daily 
celebrated the holy sacrifice of the Mass in the 
Church of Saint Bridget, and heard the confes- 
sion of the religious. He also presided at their 
meetings and gave the spiritual conferences. 
The institute was indebted to him for a great 
number of excellent subjects, who subsequently 
bore to other provinces the spirit and reputa- 
tion of Saint Angela. He was still directing 
the Congregation, when in 1568, an establish- 
ment was founded at Milan. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 161 



CHAPTER III. 

Saint Charles Borromeo and the Society of 
Saint Ursula — Establishment of the Congre- 
gation of Milan — They become cloistered — 
Saint Charles, Visitor General of the order — 
Acquires the church and priory of Saint 
Benedict for the order — Regulations intro- 
duced by him — Establishments in his diocese 
— His death — Congregation of the order at 
Parma, Foligny, Venice, Cremona, Verona, 
Veltri-, Genoa and Rome. 

Saint Charles Borromeo, who had a few j'ears 
before, in 1560, so happily brought to a close 
the council of Trent, left Rome and all the dig- 
nities which he occupied there, in order to de- 
vote himself exclusively to the administration 
of his diocese. He had been welcomed in the 
metropolitan city, with the respect due to his 
eminent ability and shining virtues. Full of 
veneration for Saint Angela, he wrote to the 
Bishop of Brescia to impart his earnest desire 
of establishing a congregation of religious of 
her order in Milan, Twelve sisters were sent 
him. The holy Archbishop welcomed them with 



152 LIFE OP 



kindness, and placed them under his protection. 
Ere long they conquered the general esteem by 
their solid piety, their excellent method of in- 
struction, and the success which attended it. 
Thus far the sisters had not lived in community ; 
they assembled on certain days in the house of 
the Mother Superior to receive her instructions. 
Saint Charles sometimes attended these meet- 
ings to aid the congregation by his counsels and 
to excite them to persevere. ''Remember your 
origin," he would say, "follow the traces of 
your Sisters of Brescia. There did the venerable 
Mother Angela plant the tree of life which pro- 
duces such precious fruit. Show yourselves 
here the fruitful branches, and continue to ren- 
der yourselves worthy of the glorious name 
which you bear.'' 

When the illustrious prelate had by this means 
gained the confidence of the Sisters, he without 
difficulty induced them to live in community. 
At his request Pope Gregory XIII. issued a 
brief, in 1572, by which he confirmed the insti- 
tute of Mother Angela Merici, and authorized 
her daughters to live in congregation. He 
moreover permitted them to form similar estab- 
lishments whereever they shall be requested. 
From this time the Ursulines of Milan taught 
only in the common house, and lived there in 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 153 



cloister, going out only by leave of the mother 
Superior. But four years after they crossed the 
threshold of their cloister to fly with Saint Charles 
to the assistance of the plague-stricken. They 
were found in every section of the city, nursing 
the sick, burying the dead, devoting themselves 
to all good works that Christian charity can in- 
spire, under such deplorable circumstances. 
They thus acquired the confidence of families, 
who would afterwards have no other instruct- 
resses for their daughters. The order of Saint 
Ursula needed a Visitor General apostolical. 
This institution became the more necessary as 
the family of Saint Angela had received very 
great increase. Saint Charles having been en- 
treated to request it of the holy See, was him- 
self selected by Pope Gregory XIII. for this im- 
portant place. He visited the mother house in 
1580 : the city of Brescia received him with the 
honors due to his character and his eminent vir- 
tue. They ceded to him, for the Ursulines, the 
Church and priory of Saint Benedict. It was, 
at that time, a benefice possessed by Count Ar- 
canius de Martinengue, a relative of William, 
whom Saint Angela had reconciled in so extra- 
ordinary a manner. 

The Congregation of Brescia then contained 
several novices, who were about to pronounce 



154 LIFE OP 



their vows, Saint Charles presided at this cere- 
mony which was performed at the Cathedral 
with great pomp. All the religious in the 
habit of the order had the happiness of receiv- 
ing from his hand. 

On returning from Milan, the holy arch- 
bishop issued a decree, which was to apply alike 
to the two primitive congregations. Among 
other things it directed that the daughters of 
Saint Ursula should remain subject to the 
jurisdiction of the bishops, wherever they might 
establish communities. 

The order extended more and more every 
year! cities were emulous of obtaining such 
able instructresses for the young. These founda- 
tions were made the more easily as the religious 
everywhere bore the same disinterestedness ; 
asking only what was strictly necessary, and 
even that was often wanting. Every town of 
any importance in the Milanese, was thus en- 
dowed in a short time with a house of these 
holy virgins, so that that of Milan was regarded 
as the second province or primitive congrega- 
tion of the order of Saint Ursula. This was the 
work of Saint Charles Borromeo. His prema- 
ture death which occurred on the 11th of No 
vember, 1584, caused great grief in these commu- 
nities. From the time of his canonization in 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 155 



1610, many houses of Ursulines have celebrated 
his feast as a solemn one, on account of the 
protection with which he had honored the order, 
as well as for the perfect instructions which he 
had left it. 

About 1595, a new congregation was estab- 
lished at Parma, under the protection of Ranucio 
Farnese, who was then duke. This prince 
spared no exertion to establish this foundation 
on a firm footing, and render it useful to his 
subjects. He composed it of noble virgins, 
who, at a later date, founded that of Pia- 
cenza. 

The house at Foligny, in the diocese of Spo- 
leto, owes its origin to the celebrated Paula, 
of Foligny* A faithful imitator of Saint An- 
gela, she was inspired by God to found in her 
own city, a congregation of the order. The 
learned Cardinal Baronius, in concert with the 
Bishop of Foligny, examined the constitutions. 
Paula of Foligny, who was named Superior, 
was soon at the head of fifty sisters, all ani- 
mated with a holy rivalry to advance God's 
glory. After the example of those of Brescia, 
Milan, and Parma, the sisters of Foligny de- 
voted themselves to instructing girls in read- 
ing, writing, and catechism. Their particular 
constitutions require them to direct the in ten- 



156 LIFE OF 



tion of their prayers to the spiritual good of 
the Church, and of the monastic orders. 

Pope Urban VIIL employed Paula of Fo- 
ligny to found another establishment at Vescia, 
a little town of the same diocese. Thither she 
bore with her the spirit of Saint Angela, whom 
she had adopted as her model in all things. 
After having thus imitated her in her works, 
and especially in her penitential life, she mer- 
ited to die like her the death of the just, July 
20th, 1647, in the seventy-sixth year of her 
age. 

We have seen that Saint Angela, on her re- 
turn from Jerusalem, had been earnestly re- 
quested to stay in Venice. When they learned 
that she had effected the enterprise wliich she 
then meditated, according to God's promises, 
they solicited a congregation of Ursulines, which 
was no sooner established, than it drew on it 
the consideration of all the inhabitants of that 
republic. 

The city of Cremona, where Saint Angela 
was so well-known, in consequence of the stay 
which she had made there during the wars of 
Italy, learning the miracles wrought at her 
tomb, and the progress of her institute, wislied 
also to enjoy the advantages of a congregation 
of Ursulines. The house of Cremona, founded 



J i 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 15T 



in 1565, and approved by Popes Gregory XIII. 
and Clement VIII., has produced many religious 
of eminent virtue. 

Verona, situated in the States of Venice, not 
far from Desenzano, had also its congregation, 
established apparently, shortly after the death 
of Saint Angela. 

Feltri, an episcopal see, like Verona, situ- 
ated in the same states, was endowed with a 
similar institution, a few years after the prin- 
cipal foundation. 

The Ursulines established at Genoa, about 
1573, had for their foundress Mother Venarcia, 
who governed the congregation for sixty- years. 
Although she received no primary education, 
she composed four volumes of spirituality. The 
senate of Genoa had conceived so high an idea 
of her virtues, that they undertook the process 
of her canonization soon after her death which 
took place in 1633. 

The congregation of Saint Ruffina and Saint 
Secunda at Rome, the foundation of which dates 
from 1601, owes its commencement to two for- 
eign ladies, one from Paris, the other from 
Flanders. The former, Frances de Montjoux, 
went to Italy, intending to make a pilgrimage 
to the Holy Land, but Pope Clement VIII. di- 
verted her from a voyage that seemed incom- 

14 



158 LIFE OF 



patible with her delicate situation, and would 
moreover expose her to serious danger. He fur- 
nished her an isolated house in Rome, where she 
devoted herself to the rigors of penance, wearing 
the habit of the Poor Clares, which she had as- 
sumed before leaving France. 

The second lady, Frances de Gorercy, of an 
illustrious house in Flanders, having become a 
widow at an early age, and being fatherless and 
motherless, resolved to leave her own land, and 
repaired at first to Cologne, where she spent 
several years unknown to all but God, laboring 
for her support, and giving all the surplus to 
the poor. Having gone to Rome, to gain the 
jubilee of 1600, she lodged like other pilgrims 
at the hospital of San-Sisto. Her confessor, who 
was not long in discovering her merit, spoke to 
her of Sister Montjoux, as an amiable virgin. 
No sooner were these two holy souls acquainted, 
than they resolved to lead a common life. 
Their conversation turning one day on the good 
done in Italy by the ministry of the Ursulines, 
they were at the same time surprised that an 
institute so eminently useful to the young, had 
not been introduced at Rome. In this way, 
God inspired them with the idea of commencing 
the work. Clement VIII. encouraged them; 
they employed their patrimony in the acquisi- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 159 



tion of ground large enough to receive the ne- 
cessary buildings, and persons desirous of for- 
warding the good work, aided them in the en- 
terprise. The next year they received novices 
of every rank, to whom they gave the name of 
Ursulines. It happened soon after that Pope 
Paul V. united the parish of Saint RuflBna and 
Saint Secunda to that of Santa Maria-trans- 
tevere. The church, thus rendered in a manner 
useless, was given to the Ursulines by the sov- 
ereign Pontiff. Mother Montjoux died in 1628, 
and her associate in the foundation, who sur- 
vived till 1641, saw the most holy fervor reign- 
ing in her numerous community. 

Such was the prodigious increase which the 
order, founded by Saint Angela, acquired in 
Italy. We shall now see it penetrate into 
France, where it will bear, as in every other 
place where it has since been propagated, seeds 
of virtue, and produce the fruit of purest doc- 
trine. 



160 LIFE OP 



CHAPTER 17. 

Extension of the order of Saint Ursula in 
France — Mother Frances de Bermont — Con- 
gregation of Avignon— ^Devotion to Saint 
Angela — Her beatification by Pope Pius VI. — 
She is canonized by Pope Pius VIL 

The little town of L'Isle in the County of 
Vienne, not far from Avignon, was the first in 
France to possess a house of Ursulines. This 
establishment was founded in 1596, by Frances de 
Bermont, who was raised up by God to extend 
on the soil of France, and in other parts of 
Europe, the glory of Saint Angela, till then con- 
centrated in the limits of Italy. Gifted with 
the happiest qualities of mind and heart, Mad- 
amoiselle de Bermont had, at the age of twelve, 
composed a poem which was deemed worthy of 
publication. But a few years later, she re- 
nounced the enjoyments which literature offered 
her rich imagination, in order to give herself 
entirely to God. While still young, she was 
seen associating with herself some ladies of 
Avignon, her native place, to form a congrega- 
tion of Ursulines. They began by gathering at 
their respective houses, the children of the poor 
and of the working-classes. The whole city ap- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 161 



plauded the devotedness of these new mission- 
aries. The Archbishop, especially, Monseigneur 
Grimaldi, took a lively interest in the associa- 
tion. At his request, the Sovereign Pontiff, 
Clement VII., authorized this interesting com- 
munity to teach the Christian doctrine in the 
County. They procured the Constitutions of the 
Ursulines of Milan. Monseigneur Grimaldi, 
Father de Bermont, the director of the Sisters, 
and the Blessed Caesar de Bus, who was then at 
Avignon, made a joint examination of them ; and 
with one accord, advised the holy associates to af- 
filiate themselves to the monastery already found- 
ed beyond the Alps. Madamoiselle de Vaucleuse, 
one of them, then offered a furnished house in 
the town of L'Isle belonging to her. The Sis- 
ters took possession almost immediately under 
the direction of Madamoiselle de Bermont, who 
was appointed Superior. 

The tidings of this establishment soon reached 
Aix and Marseilles."^ Mother de Bermont was 
called upon to found congregations there, and 
thus showed in all Provence that Heaven had 
destined her to revive the wisdom and humility 
of Saint Angela. The institute was not long in 
making itself known in the rest of the kingdom; 

* The congregation of Aix began in 1600, that of Mar- 
seiUes was founded three years after. 

14* 



162 LIFE OP 



and we may say, that after the house of Milan, 
of which they were filiations, the Ursulines of 
Provence became themselves the spiritual Mo- 
thers of most of the houses subsequently estab- 
lished in Europe. 

Meanwhile the congregation of Paris first 
gave the daughters of Saint Angela the exam- 
ple of the highest perfection, and in this regard, 
it deserves to hold the first rank among the nine 
congregations which were established in France."* 
Each of these formed till 1792, an affiliation of 
convents, in which the Ursulines, restricted in- 
deed to the institute of Saint Angela, neverthe- 
less differed in the various particular Constitu- 
tions added. They were like so many provinces 
of the order ; for, in most cases, they comprised 
a considerable district of country, in which all 
the convents followed the same discipline. 
There never were, - however, provincial gov- 
ernors or superiors, at least in France ; for the 
Ursulines were there always subject to the ju- 
risdiction of the Bishops. 

Many miracles were wrought, as we have 
seen, at the tomb of Saint Angela. It would 

*The centres ofthese were Paris, Lyons, Bordeaux, Dijon, 
Toulouse, Tulle, Aries ; the two last were composed of re- 
ligious not bound by monastic vows, but merely congre- 
gated. 



SAINT Ais^GELA. MERICI. 163 



be long, impossible even, to recount all these 
celestial favors obtained through the interces- 
sion of Saint Angela. There are, however, 
three which were examined during the process 
of her canonization, and recognized as really 
works which God in his mercy had wrought 
through the invocation of his holy servant. 

Angela Felipina, of Brescia, was afflicted 
with that terrible disease, the scrofula, and an 
inveterate ulcer was rapidly consuming her 
right leg. Despairing of all human aid, for her 
case defied all medical science, she invoked the 
aid of the holy virgin, Mother Angela. The 
relies of the servant of God were not applied in 
vain. Angela was perfectly and instanta- 
neously healed, and recovered her strength so 
as to show no signs of her former languor. 

Similar was the case of Maria di Aquafredda, 
also of Brescia. Struck- down by a fit of apo- 
plexy, she recovered consciousness only to find 
herself still half in the chilling hands of death. 
The right side of her body was motionless, her 
limbs and tongue refused all action, and other 
difficulties rendered her state one of helpless suf- 
fering. Saint Angela restored her to perfect 
health. 

Maria Angela Comminia, of Verona, had no 
less confidence in the foundress of the Ursu- 



164 LIFE OF 



lines. She, too, was afflicted with a complete 
paralysis of the left side, resulting from an apo- 
plectic stroke, and attended with violent pains 
in the chest. Her cure was sudden and perfect, 
and her recovery of strength complete. 

The testimony of these miracles was clear and 
indisputable. They stood all the critical tests 
and examination to which all supposed miracles 
are subjected in the course of a process of can- 
onization ; and they cannot but lead us to hope 
for the interposition of the Saint in all our dif- 
ficulties of soul and body. 

The church of Saint Afra became a place of 
pilgrimage, where the faithful of all ranks 
flocked to implore her powerful intercession 
with God. The Sovereign Pontiff, Clement 
XIIL, at first, by a decree dated 30th April, 
1768, approved the cultus, till then spontane- 
ously rendered her. On the 12th of June, 1777, 
it was declared by the Congregation of Rites, 
that the blessed Angela had received of God in 
a heroic degree, the four cardinal virtues ; and 
a few days after. Pope Pius VL confirmed this 
decision. 

Mother Mary Louisa, of Saint Joseph,^ Su- 

^Motlier Mary Louisa, of St. Joseph, was "born at Venice, 
on the 26th of December, 1718. Left an orphan at the age 
of eighteen, she was placed by two uncles, religious at 



SAIJSTT ANGELA MERICI. 165 



perior of the Ursulines of Rome, then made in- 
credible efforts to bring to a close the process 
of canonization. The convents of Prance, to the 
number of three hundred and more, with those 
of Belgium and Germany, excited by her active 
correspondence, subscribed to meet the expense 
naturally entailed by these proceedings. From 
Rome she directed in Brescia the necessary 
operations for the discovery of documents. A 
conflagration had consumed the archives, on 
which the memoirs, touching the miracles ef- 
fected by Saint Angela were comprised. She 
found means to obtain from other convents 
copies of these and other important documents. 
The truth of the miracles was verified with ex- 
treme attention by a full communion of Cardi- 

Rome, in one of the convents of that capital of the Chris- 
tian world. It was here that her vocation was evinced, 
but her choice fell on the Ursuline convent of Rome. At 
the age of forty, she was elected Superior, and held this 
office, alternately with that of assistant for many years. 
In her novitiate, she had conceived the idea of laboring 
for the canonization of Saint Angela, associating with her 
subsequently a French novice of the name of Sister Ber- 
nardine. The activity of her mind, and her physical 
strength were sometimes exhausted in researches after the 
necessary documents for the conclusion of the process. 
This venerable Mother died on the 26th of January, 1802, 
without seeing her desires realized by the canonization of 
Saint Angela. 



166 LIFE OP 



nals, who, after a three-fold examination, pro- 
nounced in favor of their authenticity. 

On the report of these eminently enlightened 
dignitaries, Pius VL, after invoking the divine 
light, solemnly decided on the 27 th of January, 
1790, that three miraculous cures had been un- 
doubtedly wrought by the mediation of the 
Blessed Angela Merici. On the 15th of the fol- 
lowing August, he declared that her canoniza- 
tion might in all security be proceeded with. 
But the French Revolution, which burst out at 
that time, troubled the peace of the Church. 

Her venerable head could not himself canon- 
ize the servant of God. It was Pius VIII., who, 
on the 24th of May, 1807, terminated this 
affair, so important to the order of Saint Ur- 
sula, and to all Christendom. Four other 
beatified servants of God, Caraccioli, Benedict 
of Saint Philadelpho, Colette Boilet, and Hya- 
cinth Mariscotti, were at the same time canon- 
ized. His holiness pronounced on this solemn 
occasion, an allocution worthy of the head of 
the Church, in which he returned thanks to God 
for having offered God such illustrious models, 
after the terrible storms which had just burst 
over the face of Catholicity. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 167 



BOOK V. 



CHAPTER I. 

Mother de Bermond — Foundress of the French 
Ursulines — Her labors — Blessed Mary of the 
Incarnation J and Madame de Saint e Beuve — 
The Ursulines of Paris — Pope Paul V, erects 
the community into a religious order — Mother 
Cecilia the first Ursuline JVun — Spread of the 
order in Finance. 

France was, as we have seen, the land where 
the work of Saint Angela reached its greatest 
development, and whence it extended far and 
wide. Here it first became a religious order ; 
varying according to the various cougrega lions 
formed, all retaining the rule and spirit of Saint 
Angela; but with particular Constitutions to 
suit the work, that each, in its own sphere, was 
called upon to perform. As a religious order, 
the Ursulines spread from France to Belgium, 
Ireland, Germany, Canada, Louisiana, then 
French colonies ; Germany and Belgium be- 
stowed the order on Italy, Louisiana on Cuba, 



168 LIFE OF 



France, Ireland Canada, and Germany, on the 
United States. 

Multiform in its constitutions, rules, and his- 
tory, we cannot here give the history of the 
order, but we propose to treat, first in general, 
of the Ursulines in Prance ; their successful la- 
bors, their heroic constancy, and even martyr- 
dom, during the reign of terror. The origin 
of the convents of the order in Germany, Ire- 
land, and America, will then form a chapter 
singularly edifying, full of consolation and en- 
couragement, and calculated no less to inspire 
us with the most profound submission to God's 
holy will in love. 

The order of Saint Ursula, which had spread 
over many towns of Italy, owed its introduction 
into France, as we have seen, to Frances de 
Bermond. This mother of many daughters was 
born at Avignon, in 1572, of most excellent 
and pious parents. Peter de Bermond, her fa- 
ther, was treasurer of Prance for Provence, and 
receiver of the customs of the port of Marseilles. 
Of the nine children whom his wife, Perette de 
Marsillon, bore him, one, their only son, became 
a priest of the Oratory, and died^in the odor of 
sanctity, and five daughters became nuns. No 
sooner was Frances born, than her parents of- 
fered her to the Blessed Virgin, putting their 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 169 



infant daughter under the special protection of 
the Mother of Purity. This was not a mere im- 
pulse of pious fervor, but a real offering; 
and they brought up their daughter with every 
possible care, inspiring her tender heart with a 
love of virtue, and a horror of vice, especially of 
falsehood. She was full of talent, and wrote 
with such ease and elegance, that some of her 
juvenile poems were printed. This led her to 
the perusal of light and trifling wojks ; but 
generously renouncing all the vanities of the 
world, she resolved to consecrate herself to God. 

She accordingly took a vow of chastity, and 
placed herself under the direction of Father 
Romillon, of the Christian doctrine. Her sudden 
conversion caused a great deal of raillery in the 
gay circles in which she had moved, but she 
showed the ascendancy of her genius by gaining 
some of her former associates to her new ideas, 
and with them she devoted herself to works of 
piety, and especially to catechising and instruct- 
ing children. 

Among the penitents of Father Romillon, was 

the daughter of the Baron de Vaucleuse, who 

also sought to devote herself to a life of piety and 

sacrifice. The bishop of Carpentras, in whose 

hands she had made a vow of virginity, gave 

her a copy of the Constitutions of the Ursulines 

15 



170 LIFE OP 



of Milan, which she showed to her director. 
That good religious, on examining it, proposed 
to Madamoiselle de Bermond and her compan- 
ions, to adopt the rule of Saint Angela ; they 
readily assented, and the young baroness, now 
by her father^s death, mistress of her fortunes, 
hired and furnished a house at Lille, in Ve- 
naissin, promising to join them as soon as her 
temporal affairs should be settled. 

The little community of French Ursulines 
thus founded in 1594, consisted of twenty-five 
members, who made a simple vow of obedience 
in the hands of Father Bomillon as Superior. 
Their example, and the zeal which they dis- 
played, excited general admiration. Many other 
places became desirous of possessing so excel- 
lent an Institute, and Mother de Bermond trav- 
elled in the humblest mode to found these vari- 
ous congregations at Aix, Marseilles, Pontvise, 
Paris, and other parts ; while Mother Margaret 
Vigier, of Saint Ursula, one of her first com- 
panions, under the direction of the Ven. Caesar 
de Bus, founded a house at Toulouse, which 
became the parent of a separate branch of the 
order, and indirectly the guide also of the Ur- 
sulines of Bordeaux, the largest and most im- 
portant of all."^ 

Histoire des Orders Religieuv yerbo Ursn- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 171 



The Ursulines were still a simple congrega- 
tion, living in community according to the form 
given by Saint Charles Borromeo to those of 
Milan, but a new feature was now introduced, 
and gradually almost all the Ursulines of vari- 
ous congregations made solemn vows, and be- 
came cloistered religious. 

The house in Paris was founded in 1604, by 
a colony of Ursulines, who followed Sister Ni- 
cole le Pelletier from Pontvise, on the invita- 
tion of Madamoiselle Acarie, the foundress of 
the French Carmelites, among whom she subse- 
quently entered as a lay sister, assuming the 
name of Mary of the Incarnation. This blessed 
serrant of God, for she is now beatified by the 
Church, invited the Ursulines to found a house, 
as their special object was teaching, which, 
though not contemplated by their rule, had 
nevertheless been undertaken by the Carme- 
lites. These holy religious had drawn around 
them and formed many pious young women, not 
called by God to their severe order, but still 
anxious to devote themselves to the service of 
God. These were soon formed by the Ursu- 
lines of Pontvise, who came to Paris for that 
purpose. As the mere list of names on our 
pages shows, France was then hallowed by a 
number of devoted and saintly persons in every 



172 LIFE OP 



rank of life. Piety was not confined to the 
cloister, persons of all classes and conditions of 
life aspired to perfection, and several attained 
the most eminent sanctity. It was to this happy 
circumstance that the order of Saint Angela 
owed its rapid and consoling progress. The house 
at Paris needed a founder, and the holy Madamoi- 
selle Acarie looked around for one whose piety 
and wealth would enable her to assume that po- 
sition. She soon found all she needed in Mad- 
ame de Sainte Beuve, widow of Claude de Roux, 
a counsellor of the parliament of Paris. From 
the death of her husband, she had led the life 
of a religious, renouncing the. world, which of- 
fered in vain its incense to the young, beautiful, 
wealthy, and a.ccomplished widow. 

Madame de Sainte Beuve readily undertook 
the task proposed by the holy Madamoiselle 
Acarie. She obtained for the Ursulines, what 
they had not hitherto had, pupils of the first 
families in Paris ; by her connection with it, 
eleven young ladies were entered as boarders ; 
Madame de Sainte Beuve now purchased ground 
for the erection of a convent. Monsieur de Mar- 
illac, Master of Requests, the father of the first 
pupil, drew the plans of the building. In order 
to form the new Ursulines completely, Madame 
de Sainte Beuve now invited two of the Sisters 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 173 



of Provence to come and imbue the new com- 
munity with the spirit of the Holy Virgin of 
Brescia. Mother de Bermond, herself, with one 
companion, accordingly repaired to Paris. 
Hitherto, the object contemplated had been 
merely to found a congregation like those in 
other parts of France, but such had not been 
the view of Madame de Sainte Beuve, who now 
declared that it had from the first been her in- 
tention to make it a monastery of religious. A 
petition to carry out this view was now drawn 
up and addressed by her to the Sovereign Pon- 
tiff. Rejoiced to find a new order of nuns thus 
arising in that land, which Calvinism had made 
such desperate efforts to gain, his Holiness, 
Pope Paul v., on the 13th of June, 1612, is- 
sued a bull erecting the first monastery of the 
Ursuline order. 

On the announcement of the intention of 
Madame de Sainte Beuve, Mother de Bermond 
and her companion had been re-called to Pro- 
vence, and the Abbess, Anne de Roussy, of the 
Abbey of Saint Stephen at Soissons, had been 
invited to Paris, to form the Ursulines to the 
religious state which they were so soon to as- 
sume. 

By the bull of erection, the order was to be 

under the rule of Saint Augustine, and the in- 

15* 



174 LIFE OF 



vocation of Saint Ursula, subject to the jurisdic- 
tion of the Bishop of Paris, and under his au- 
thority to three doctors in theology. The Ur- 
sulines, besides the three ordinary religious 
vows, of poverty, chastity, and obedience, were 
to take a fourth solemn vow, by which they 
bound themselves to instruct girls. The novi- 
tiate was at first fixed at two years, but subse- 
quently reduced to one. The dress was a grey 
habit, with a black robe and cloak, and the 
leathern girdle of Saint Agustine. 

The new religious, to the number of twelve, 
assumed the habit and the white veil with great 
pomp on the 11th of November, 1612, Monseig- 
neur Henri de Gondi, Bishop of Paris, oiBficiating 
in the presence of Cardinal de Gondi, and se- 
veral princesses and ladies of high rank. 

Madame de Sainte Beuve continued to enter- 
tain and display the liveliest interest in this 
monastery, which she subsequently enlarged 
and endowed amply. At last, when her whole 
fortune, spent in good works, had been lent to 
Our Lord, when she herself led a life of poverty, 
as she had long led a life of exemplary piety, 
this devoted servant of God expired amid the 
sobs of the poor, on the 29th of August, 1630. 
Great are the temptations of wealth, greater 
when youth and beauty are the lot of the pos- 



SAINT AXGKT.A MERICI. 175 



sessor ; but in the life of Madame de Sainte 
Beuve, we see how God guides those who cor- 
respond to his grace, and how every state of 
life is compatible with sanctity. Let us never 
then despond in our various circumstances, 
fidelity to God's grace, to prayer, and to the 
obligations of our state of life, will lead us all 
to the perfection which our Lord bids us all to 
seek.* 

The first religious of Saint Ursula, was Mo- 
ther Cecilia de Belloy, of the Cross, born in 
Picardy, in 1583, who had long desired to em- 
brace the religious state, and had entered the 
Ursulines of Paris as soon as it was proposed 
to found a religious order- She was the first of 
the twelve who received the habit, and the first 
who made her profession in September, 1614. 
Seven months afterwards she proceeded to Ab- 
beville in Picardy, where she founded a convent, 
and within the next few years, similar houses 
at Amiens, Crepy, and Montargis. In the es- 
tablishment of this last, she met with great dif- 
ficulties : but her humility was great, her confi- 
dence in God unbounded. To her, this portion 
of his cross was a sure guarantee that our Lord 
would protect the house erected in his honor. 

^ Heljot, Histoire des Ordres Religieux. (Ed. MegneJ 
m. 762, 



176 LIFE Of 



Ah ! how happy should we be, if in the same 
spirit we met the trials and tribulations of life. 
Surely, however, Jesus will not disdain to love 
those whom he deigns to make partakers of his 
cross."^ 

While Mother Ceciliaf was thus extending 
the order of Saint Ursula, others from the house 
at Paris, then and later, founded convents at 
Rennes, Eu^ Rouen, Caen, Saint Omers, Saint 
Denis, Bourges. Falaise, and Bayeux. Several 
houses of the congregations of Dijon and Lyons, 
of which we shall speak, and among others, those 
in Canada also embraced the rule of Paris, which 
thus extended to Kistzingen. and Erford, in 
Thuririgia, a province of Germany. 

When Helyot wrote his history of Monastic 
Orders, more than a century ago, there were 
nearly a hundred houses that followed this rule* 
It has undergone modifications, however, chiefly 
in 1640, when, by permission of His Holiness, 
Pope Urban VIII., new constitutions were 
drawn up, more complete in matter^ and meth- 
odical in form, adapted to the life which they 
led, and the exigencies of the field in which the 
Almighty had, for the good of France, called 
these daughters of Saint Angela to labor. 

* Helyot, Histoire des Ordres Religieux. (Ed, Megne} 
III. 768. t She died on tlie 21st of August, 1639. 



SAIXT ANGELA MERICI. 177 



Of the houses of the rule of Paris which have 
existed in America, we shall treat in another 
chapter ; but two of those in France having a 
bearing on those in this country demand a 
brief notice. 

The convents of Amiens and Abbeville were, 
as we have said, founded by Mother Cecilia, the 
first Ursuline nun. A few years after, Francis 
de Wicquet, Lord of Dringhen, moved with the 
desire of imparting to Boulogne the benefits 
which everywhere followed the introduction of 
the Ursulines, applied to the Bishop of Amiens, 
and on the first of July, 1624, Mothers Saint 
Augustine, Saint Josse, and Mother de la Trin- 
ite, with a Mother and lay sister from Abbe- 
ville, were chosen to found the new house. Postu- 
lants soon appeared, and the monastery of Bou- 
logne was soon one of the mo^ numerous and 
fervent in France. After being a nursery of 
piety in Boulogne for over a century, the con- 
vent of Saint Ursula was seized at the begin- 
ning of the Revolution, and the community was 
scattered far and wide, subjected to insult, im- 
prisonment and sufi*ering in every shape. Many 
fell victims to the violence of the times. As 
soon as the first burst of the storm had spent 
its fury, a few Sisters, filled with supernatural 
coura^ge and devotedness, gathered around Mo- 



178 LIFE OF 



ther de Saint Maxime, who restored the com- 
munity, and founded a new convent in 1812. 
The blessing of God attended her labors, and 
long before her happy death, she beheld a nu- 
merous community of the order of Saint An- 
gela around her. 

Since that time the extension of the schools, 
particularly of that which is destined to furnish 
gratuitous instruction to poor girls, having be- 
come necessary, more land was acquired, and a 
spacious and convenient church and convent 
erected. The community now comprises over 
fifty religious.^ 

The house at Meaux was founded by one 
whose name is historical in the annals of Ame- 
rica. The illustrious and pious Champlain, 
founder of Quebec, had married a young Cal* 
vinistic lady, Marie Hellen BouUe, whom, how- 
over, he soon gained so completely to God, that 
with his consent they led a life of continence 
for many years. She even bound herself by 
vow to embrace the religious state, if she sur- 
vived her husband, and after his consoling 
death, she entered the monastery of Saint Jac- 
ques, at Paris, on the 7 th of November, 1645. 
Having employed her fortune to found a mon- 
astery at Meaux, Sister Helen of Saint Agus- 

* Parenty, Notice sur les Ursulines du Nord de la France. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 179 



tine, was sent there to effect this great work. 
After her profession, which took place in this 
convent, she spent the remainder of her days in 
the most perfect observance of the rule, and the 
practice of the most exalted humility and self- 
denial, the more striking in one who had from 
childhood been complete mistress of all her ac- 
tions.*^ 



CHAPTER 11. 



Mother de Bermond, foundress of the first French 
congregation of Ursulines , founds the TJrsuline 
JYuns of Lyons — The UrsuHnes of Toulouse 
and Bordeaux result from this foundation — 
Extension of these branches of the order — 
Other branches of the order in France — The 
French Revolution — TJrsuline Martyrs. 

On her return from Paris, Mother de Ber- 
mond continued to extend the congregations of 
Ursulines, such as she had originally established 
them, watching with all a mother's solicitude 
over the virgins who entered the sisterhood, 
and forming them by exhortation and example, 

* Ferland, Notice sur Madame Champlain. 



180 LIFE OF 



to a close imitation of their holy foundress, Saint 
Angela. In 1610, she founded a house at Ly- 
ons, which soon contained a number of fervent 
Sisters. So pleased was the Archbishop, Mon- 
seigneur Denis de Marguemont, with the good 
effected by it, that he endeavored to give it all 
possible stability. He urged the Sisters, there- 
fore, to pass from the state of a congregation to 
that of a religious order. The Sisters readily 
consented, Mother de Bermcnd most cheerfully of 
all : the Archbishop drew up constitutions which 
were approved at Rome, with permission to the 
Sisters to take the solemn vows of religion. 
This was accordingly done in 1620. Mother de 
Bermond induced other houses to follow this 
step, and founded several new monasteries, 
which in time, exceeded a hundred in number. 
Her favorite abode was the poor convent of 
Saint Bonet, where this faithful mother of many 
daughters, after leading a life more angelic than 
human, died on the 19th of February, 1628, at 
the age of fifty-six. Happy they, who like her, 
give to God's service not the few declining 
years of decrepit age, but youth with all its 
generous impulses, and the cooler offering of 
maturity.* 

Among the first disciples of Mother de Ber- 

* Helyot, Histoire des Ordres Religitjux. III. 785. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 181 



mond at Lille, was Margaret de Vigier, the 
daughter of a merchant of that city. Under 
that skilful mistress, Mother de Vigier made 
rapid progress in all kinds of virtues, and being 
naturally one of great talents, especially in the 
instruction of youth, and the direction of her 
Sisters, she became in time the foundress of a 
great number of houses. 

Having passed to the house at Avignon, she 
placed herself under the direction of Father 
Caesar de Bus, and by his advice founded a house 
at Chabeuil. On the invitation of Cardinal de 
Joyeuse, Archbishop of Toulouse, she proceeded 
to that city in 1604, and aided by a generous 
counsellor in the parliament, M. Bouret, she 
triumphed over all difficulties, and founded a 
house in which she began to lead a more retired 
and re-collected life, preparing, in fact, for the 
religious state which she desired to embrace. 
Her rule, drawn up with the aid of her brother, 
and the venerable Father de Bus, enforces the 
most rigorous poverty, and breathes throughout 
the spirit of God. It was approved in 1615, by 
His Holiness, Pope Paul Y., who erected the 
house of Toulouse into a monastery. While a 
simple congregation, the convent of Toulouse 
had had one filiation, but no sooner did the 
Ursulines enter the religious state, than city 

16 ^ 



182 LIFE OF 



after city solicited their presence. Ere long, 
twenty houses followed this rule, the severest of 
all, for the nuns not only devote themselves to 
the laborious duty of instruction, but also chant 
the divine office.* 

Cardinal de Sourdes, Archbishop of Bordeaux, 
edified by the good effected in various parts of 
France by the communities of Ursulines, became 
anxious to secure to his diocese such valuable 
auxiliaries. Several young women of great piety 
had long been directed by his confessor, and the 
Archbishop looked upon these as the nucleus 
of the institute which he was to form. Frances 
de Cazeres, the oldest and most experienced, 
with two companions, proceeded to Toulouse, 
and in the Ursuline convent there imbibed the 
spirit of the order, and the method of instruc- 
tion, which the sisters there had so successfully 
practised. Returning to Bordeaux, in 1606, 
Mother Frances of the Cross, as she now styled 
herself from her love for Jesus crucified, began 
her congregation. Many joined her ; but the 
number of pupils who crowded to their school 
as postulants increased, however, she was able 
to found other houses, and established commu- 

* Mother Vigier died on tlie 14th of December, 1646, in 
her convent of Yillefrsinche.—Hehjoty Histoire des Ordres 
Religieux, III. 774. 



SAINT ANGELA. MEUICI. 183 



nities of her congregation at Lebourne, Bourg, 
Saint Macaire, Laval, Poitiers and Angers. 
These were all erected into monasteries in 1618, 
by Pope Paul V., and the Sisters took solemn 
vows, becoming cloistered nuns. 

Her order now spread rapidly, and became 
the most important branch of the Ursulines, 
comprising, prior to the French revolution, over 
one hundred houses. It extended to Belgium, 
Germany, Italy and America. The- house at 
Liege, originally a congregation of Sisters, 
adopted the rule of Bordeaux, in 1622. From it 
proceeded the houses at Cologne and Prague, 
and the convent of Vienna, of which the first 
members were all titled ladies."^ The convent 
at Rome founded by Pope Innocent XL, was com- 
menced by six religious from the convent at 
Brussels, and subsequently received accessions 
from other houses in Belgium. 

The Ursulines of this congregation chant the 
divine office of the Blessed Virgin on holidays, 
and on other days say the whole rosary. Besides 
the fasts ordained by the Churchy they fast on 
the eves of many festivals, and every day in 
Advent.t 

* The baronesses of Graiman, Blier, Salburg, Lasperg, 
Haiberg, Poulz and Volhra, and the Countesses of Gaurian 
and Fox. 

t Heljot, Histore des Ordres Reli^fieux. III. 778. 



184 ' LIFE OF 



Besides these branches of the order, others 
soon rose in France. That of Dijon was founded 
as a congregation by Mother Frances de Xaim- 
tonge in 1607, and the Sisters embraced the reli- 
gious state by permission of Pope Paul V., in 
1619. That of Burgundy was founded by a sister 
of the foundress of that of Dijon, Mother Anne 
de Xaintonge, and soon spread over Switzer- 
land."^ The Ursulines of Tulle recognise as 
their foundress Mother Antoinette Micolon, who 
failing to unite the various bodies of Ursulines 
in France, or obtain her aggregation to that of 
Bordeaux, obtained the Papal approval of her 
rule ill 1623.t 

Mother Jane de Rampale, whose father, re- 
nouncing the world, entered the society of Jesus, 
as her mother and sisters did that of Saint 
Ursula, followed her mother's example. They 
joined the Ursulines of Avignon, while still a 
congregation, and Mother Jane was one of the 
foundresses of the house at Aries, which she 
governed for twenty years. In 1625, she effected 
the change by which it, like so many others, be- 
came a monastery. She also founded a convent 
at Avignon with some few others, and died in 
the monastery of Avignon on the 7th of July, 

* Helyot. III. 788, 804. 
fid. 794. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 185 



1636, in the odor of sanctitj. Her eminent 
sanctity was indeed attested by so many miracles, 
that her body which was incorrupt was removed 
from the spot where she in her humility had 
ordered it to be interred and transported to the 
church.*^ 

The Ursulines of the Presentation, who were, 
at a later date, the restorers of the house at New 
Orleans, where their rule is still observed, re- 
cognize as their foundress, Mother Lucretia de 
Gastineau. Her community was one of the 
congregations orignally formed by Mother de 
Bermond, being a filiation of the house of Pont- 
Saint-Esprit, founded by that venerable Mother. 
Sister de Gastineau entered the house of Pont- 
Saint-Esprit, and was soon an example to all for 
her humility, exactness, and earnest endeavor 
to obtain perfection in spite of trials and temp- 
tations of every kind. This induced Mother 
de Luynes, the superior, to choose her to found 
the house at Avignon, in 1623. Here she be- 
came the mistress of novices, and after forming 
the many Sisters who entered the congregation, 
proposed to them to become nuns by taking the 
vows of religion. On their agreeing to her 
proposals, she drew up rules in concert with 
Father Bourgoin, third General of the Congre- 

^ Helyot, III. 798. 
16^ 



186 LIFE OP 



gation of the Priest, of the Oratory, and applied 
to Rome for an approval- Pope Urban VIII. 
did not reject their petition, but by his brief of 
February 19, 1637, erected their community into 
a monastery under the rule of Saint Augustine^ 
the invocation of Saint Ursula, and the title of 
the Presentation of Our Lady^ a title vrhich 
this Monastery assumed. Mother de Gastineau 
saw her order extend to various cities, and at 
last died on the 30th of August, 1657, from 
wounds caused in an effort to save her Sisters 
from accident.^ 

Multiplied under so many different forms, the 
order of St. Ursula spread for nearly two cen- 
turies over France and Belgium, meeting every- 
where the wants of the faithful, hj giving a 
religious education to youth. At the epoch of 
the Revolution, this institute was not only one 
of the most widely diffused, bat also the most 
edifying. In those unhappy days, the various 
communities were expelled from their monas- 
teries, and scattered far and wide. Many of the 
nuns were imprisoned, and put to death ; the 
survivors, faithful to the spirit of the rule, sought 
to continue their labors by forming schools for 
girls. Where possible, a few would gather to- 
gether around some heroic sister, like Mother 

* Helyot, III. 801. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 187 



St. Maxime, and restore the conventual life at 
the first (lawn of peace. 

Among those who, falling victims to the fury 
of the Revolution, occupy the most illustrious 
page in the martyrology of the Ursulines, are 
Mother Clotilda Paillot, superior of the Ursu- 
lines of Valenciennes, and her ten companions. 
When the French army, devastating all before 
them, entered Valenciennes, the Sisters had re- 
tired to* Mods, and returned to Valenciennes 
when it was in the hands of the Austrians. On 
the re-capture of the city by the Republican 
forces, twelve Sisters were at once arrested and 
conducted, with other religious and several 
priests, to the Church of Notre Dame de la 
Chaussee. Providence saved one of the Ursu- 
lines by a kind of miracle, and this one Sister 
Angelica Lepont, lived to restore the community 
twenty-three years after. As some pretext was 
needed, the Sisters were accused of treasonable 
correspondence with the enemy, tried by John 
Baptist Lacoste, representative of the people, 
and put to death on the 17th and 23d of Octo- 
ber, 1794. 

On the former day five shed their blood on the 
scaffold. They were Mothers Nathalie Vanot, 
who thus closed, at the age of seventy-two, a life 
of which nearly fifty had been spent in the 



188 LIFE OF 



strictest observance of the rule, Laurentine 
Pria, Ursula Bourlard, Maria Louisa Ducres, 
and Augustina Dujardin. One of the survivors 
wrote : ** Like Saint Ursula and her companions, 
we are going in a few days to lay down our 
lives for His love and the maintenance of the 
faith. The consolations that we experience at 
the sight of this favor are beyond expression ; 
this proves the power of grace, and without it 
we should sink under the weight of our pains. 
Five of us have already met the guillotine — they 
did not walk, they flew to the scaffold. One of 
them wishing to be executed before the rest, was 
obliged to descend from the block and ascend 
again. They were allowed only a chemise and 
skirt, and proceeded with their hands tied be- 
hind their backs. We expect the same fate. I 
am sure that my letter will reach you after my 
death. God's judgments are inscrutable, grant 
us the aid of your prayers. The priests are 
executed and this augments our martyrdom." 

A few days after this letter, the Mother Supe- 
rior, Clotilde Paillot, after vainly endeavoring 
to save her Sisters by assuming the whole act, 
Mothers Josephine Leroux, Scholastica Leroux, 
Frances Delcroix, Anna Maria Raux, and Sister 
Mary Cordula Bare were put to death, full of 
inexpressible joy, as they had on the eve been 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 189 



enabled to receive holy communion from the 
hands of a priest confined in the same prison. 
On their way to the scafi*old they chanted the 
Te Deum and the Litany of the Blessed Virgin, 
edifying all by their death as they had by their 
life* 



CHAPTER III. 

Ursuline Convents in Canada and Louisiana — 
Mother Mary of the Incarnation — the Con- 
vent of Quebec — The Ursulines of Three 
Rivers and their Hospital — The Ursulines of 
JYew Orleans. 

The Historians of Canada, and indeed of 
Northern America^ all delight to trace in 
glowing colors the picture of the virtues, 
ability and devotedness of Mother Mary of the 
Incarnation, the foundress of the Ursulines of 
Quebec, and men have not hesitated to bestow 
upon her the title of the Saint Teresa of New 
France. Not only has her life been twice writ- 
ten, but her letters have been collected and 
published, one writer at least being impelled 
by gratitude for favors which he had received 
through her intercession. 

^ Parentj, Notices Historiques siir les Monasteres d'Ur- 
sulines du Nord de la France, et de la Belguique, 421. 



190 LIFE OP 



*' She was adorned," says the holy Bishop 
Laval, of Quebec, ^^ with all virtues in a most 
eminent degree ; particularly with such a gift 
of prayer, and so perfect a union with God, 
that she never lost his Divine presence amidst 
the most embarrassing affairs, and the different 
occupations to which her vocation obliged her. 
She was dead to herself: Jesus alone lived and 
acted in her. God having chosen her to com- 
mence the establishment of the holy order of 
Saint Ursula in Canada, endowed her in great 
plenitude with the spirit of the Institute. She 
was a perfect superior, an excellent mistress of 
novices, capable of filling any post in a religious 
community. Her life, common exteriorly, but 
interiorly, all divine, was a living rule for her 
sisters. Her zeal for souls, particularly for the 
conversion of the Indians, was so ardent and ex- 
tensive, that she seemed to bear them all in her 
heart. We doubt not that her prayers procured 
for this infant church of Canada, in a great mea- 
sure, the favors bestowed upon it.'' 

This eminent Ursuline was born at Tours, in 
France, on the 18th of October, 1599, where her 
father, Florent Guyard, was a silk merchant, more 
eminent for uprightness and probity, than for 
wealth. Mary Guyard evinced from childhood 
a deep and tender piety, as well as a lively 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 191 



charity and compassion for the poor. When 
only fourteen, she wished to enter a convent, 
but her parents treated this as a momentary 
fervor, and at the age of seventeen, married her 
to a Mr. N. Martin, a silk manufacturer. Her 
married life was short, for she was left a widow 
at the age of nineteen ; but nevertheless, that 
period was one of almost constant sujffering. 
But this, God in his providence permitted to 
purify her soul, and elevate her in the spirit of 
prayer. On her husband's death, she was left 
without means, and soon after accepted the in- 
vitation of one of her sisters to go and aid her 
in her establishment. Here she became a per- 
fect drudge ; for, in consequence of her know- 
ledge of business, all the important part was 
thrown upon her. Yet so re-collected, so full 
of the presence of God was she, that when sit- 
ting at her desk in the hurry of trade, she ha- 
bitually raised her mind to God at every little 
interval or pause, when she took a fresh penful 
of ink, or took up a different book. Her aus- 
terities at the same time were extreme and con- 
tinual : — disciplines, hair cloth, exposure to the 
cold, mortification of the taste: and this life 
was truly supernatural, for she was favored with 
many extacies and supernatural lights. Yet 
neither toil nor prayer consumed her time, she 



192 LIFE OP 



found leisure for works of charity. In her 
sister's house, as in her own, she was the tem- 
poral and spiritual mother of the work-people 
and servants, watching over them with a deep 
sense of the responsibility of a Christian mis- 
tress. 

She had rejected very favorable offers of mar- 
riage and remained in the world only for the 
sake of her son. When he had reached the age of 
twelve, she resolved to follow the long sup- 
pressed inclination of her heart, and enter a 
religious order. She first thought of joining 
the Carmelites, but the erection of an Ursuline 
convent at Tours seemed to oflTer her a life more 
in unison with her zeal for her neighbors' sal- 
vation by the active works of charity. 

No sooner had the venerable Mother of the 
Holy Cross, foundress of the Ursulines of Bor- 
deaux, established the convent of Tours, in 
1629, than Madame Martin felt so urged by the 
spirit of God to enter the community, that, 
though without any dowry to offer, she resolved 
to apply for admission, and was received. Her 
sister and brother-in-law endeavored to pre- 
vent her step by reproaches, and by exciting 
her son against her. So long as she had la- 
bored for them, they were silent, but when she 
preferred to labor for God, they discovered that 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 193 



she was an unnatural mother ! Such is the vain 
wisdom of men; money may be squandered in 
sin, in vanity, in amusements, and the world 
has no censure; but it has an objection to make 
to every cent bestowed on God's Church, or 
God's poor. The good widow had placed her 
son with the Jesuits, and he afterwards became 
a learned and holy Benedictine. 

Assuming the name of Mary of the Incarna- 
tion, the good widow passed her novitiate in 
the utmost fervor, yet, as often happens, a prey 
to temptations of every description, such as 
never assailed her in the world. Yet this was 
not without a purpose, which, with all our blind- 
ness, we can discern in God's providence. He 
destined her to be the directress and mother of 
many others, and taught her by experience that 
she might skilfully aid those endowed with less 
strength. On the completion of her noviceship, 
she was made Mistress of Novices, and prepared 
to lead, as she supposed, the rest of her life in 
the monastery, wherein her profession had en- 
closed. But the Almighty showed her that this 
was not His will. In a vision, she beheld a 
land under the protection of Saint Joseph, to 
which Jesus and Mary invited her. At first, 
she did not know this land, but she soon heard 
interiorly : " It is Canada that has been shown 

17 



194 LIFE OF 



thee : thither must thou go to build a house for 
Jesus and Mary." 

But Canada was almost unknown to her, and 
she waited God's will in silence. Almost at the 
same time, a holy lady, Magdalen de Chauvigny, 
widow of M. de la Pel trie, having read one of the 
Relations, published by the Jesuits annually, to 
give an account of their missions in Canada, 
felt impelled to devote her fortune to the estab- 
lishment of a house in Canada, in honor of Saint 
Joseph, for the instruction and civilization of 
Indian girls, and falling sick, made a vow to do 
so on her recovery, which instantly followed. 
She had long renounced all ideas of marriage, 
and resolved to give not only her means, but 
also her personal services to the good work. 
Father Poncet, of the Society of Jesus, who had 
just arrived from Rome, proposed Mother Mary 
of the Incarnation, as one eminently suited for 
her project, and wrote to her announcing his own 
vocation to Canada, and sending her a Relation 
of those missions. This was the more extraordi- 
nary, as he did not know her, and was unknown 
to her. God alone could have acquainted him 
with her dispositions. 

The family of Madame de la Peltrie made 
great opposition, but aided by M. Bernieresde 
Louvigny, the author of the Interior Christian, 



r 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 195 



she was enabled to carry out her project. With 
letters from Father Binet, the Commander de 
Sillery, and other persons of note at Paris, she 
proceeded to Tours, to solicit Mother Mary of 
the Incarnation and a companion, to found the 
house in Canada. She found all the nuns burn- 
ing with zeal to go. Mother Mary was chosen 
at once, and as her companion, Mother Mary 
of Saint Bernard, a young nun, who triumphed 
over the opposition of her family only by the 
aid of Saint Joseph, whose name she thencefor- 
ward adopted. With the benediction of the 
Archbishop, they left Tours on the 22nd of 
February, 1639, and after a short stay in the 
convent at Paris, proceeded to Dieppe, where 
they were joined by Mother Cecilia of the Holy 
Cross. This little community, with Madame 
de la Peltrie, and three hospital Sisters, going 
to found a house in Canada, embarked on the 
Saint Joseph, for so their vessel was called. 
This illustrious Saint had been the protector of 
the project with which he inspired Mother Mary 
and Madame de la Peltrie, aiding them in every 
diflSculty and trial : he was now the patron of 
their voyage, and saved them from shipwreck. 

Their arrival in Quebec on the 1st of Au- 
gust, 1639, was followed by the immediate 
foundation, in a small and inconvenient house, 



196 LIFE OP 



of the first monastery of Saint Ursula in 
America. Full of zeal for the salvation of 
souls, Mother Mary, on landing, had prostrated 
herself on the ground to kiss the earth where 
she was now to labor, and her earliest task was 
the study of the Algonquin, to enable her to 
teach the Indian girls. The labor was so great, 
that the Sisters were sinking under it when 
other Ursulines joined them from Paris, sent by 
the venerable Mother Mary Peron of Saint 
Magdalen, the Superior at the time, who took 
a lively interest in the great work. Tours, too, 
furnished more of her devoted nuns, and a com- 
munity was thus formed. The Sisters were, 
however, of different rules, some of that of Bor- 
deaux, others of that of Paris. Father Jerome 
Lalemant, with Mother Mary of the Incarna- 
tion, who had been chosen Superior, now drew 
lip a rule, under which they lived till 1682, 
when they affiliated themselves entirely to the 
congregation of Paris. 

In a new and strange country, this convent had 
much to contend with : their first convent, 
erected in 1641, was reduced to ashes on the 
30th of December, 1650; and so great was the 
poverty of the colony, that it was proposed to 
send them back to France ; but Madame Peltrie 
was their constant support, and all generously 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 197 



aided them, the hospital nuns affording them a 
home till their monastery was re-built, as they 
did again in 1686, when a similar misfortune 
overtook the Ursulines. 

Mother Mary of the Incarnation formed her 
community by her counsel and example, and 
took the liveliest interest in all that concerned 
God^s Church. The destruction of the Huron 
mission was a deep aflSiction to her; but it only 
gave a new field to her charity. She devoted 
herself to the spiritual and temporal relief of 
the fugitive Hurons, especially the girls. After 
a life of holiness and devoted zeal, that has 
elicited the admiration of all writers, Catholic 
and Protestant, Mother Mary of the Incarnation 
died in the odor of sanctity, on the 30th of 
April, 1672, revered and honored by all, but re- 
gretted especially by the community which she 
had founded, and to which she had ever been a 
wise and prudent Mother.^ 

As we have seen, the education of Indian 
girls was one of the great objects of the academy 
established by the Ursulines of Quebec, and 
Mother Mary had learned the Algonquin and 
Montagnais, then subsequently the Huron lan- 

* Charlevoix, Vie de la Mere Marie de I'lncarnation, 
Paris, 1724. There is a sketch of her life in English in the 
work entitled Catholic Biography^ London, 1846. 

17^ 



198 LIFE OF 



guage, to be able to instruct her pupils. Iro- 
quois and Abnaki maidens were afterwards ad- 
mitted; but the Indians diminished in number, 
and the great number of pupils was soon of 
French origin. In this way it has rendered in' 
calculable service to Canada, keeping alive the 
spirit of religion, and maintaining the education 
of the young of their own sex, especially during 
those first years of British rule, when the gov- 
ernment, by suppressing the college of the Fa- 
thers of the Society of Jesus, sought to check 
the education of the Canadians. Since its 
foundation, the TJrsuline academy has formed 
more than six thousand pupils as boarders, and 
nearly twenty thousand day scholars. 

At the close of 1583, the community num- 
bered fifty-five professed nuns, and four novices; 
while their academy contained one hundred and 
sixty-eight boarders and half-boarders, and their 
free school one hundred and thirty-nine pupils.* 

Monseigneur de St. Valier, the second Bishop 
of Quebec, moved by the wants of his flock, re- 
solved to found a hospital at Three Rivers, and 
as he had just drawn some members from the 
hospital nuns of Quebec to establish a General 
Hospital there, he now appealed to the Ursu- 
lines to undertake the direction of the hospital 

* De Courcy, Les Servantes de Dieu en Canada. 28; 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 199 



at Three Rivers. As we have seen, all the 
works of mercy were originally the field se- 
lected by Saint Angela for her labors: it was, 
therefore, a return to a primitive idea of the 
order to assume the care of the sick. The Ur- 
Bulines of Quebec so regarded it. Four pro- 
fessed nuns, Mother Mary Bronet de Jesus, 
being Superior, and one lay sister, accordingly 
left the monastery of Quebec, and ascending the 
St. Lawrence, established the community of 
Ursulines of Three Rivers on the 22nd of De- 
cember, 1697. 

The pious Bishop not only erected this hospital 
with his own resources, but moreover, left it a 
regular income. The good nuns corresponded 
to the charity of the Bishop, and all the officers 
of government bore testimony to their strict ob- 
servance of their rule, and their care of the pa- 
tients confided to them. They have never lost 
their primitive fervor, but still continue to 
edify all. 

This convent has had its trials, like so many 
others in Canada, having been twice destroyed 
by fire in 1752, and in 1806 ; but in each case, 
the promptitude with which the citizens has- 
tened to furnish means for re-building, evinces 
the high regard entertained for the exemplary 
community. 



200 LIFE OF 



In December, 1853, this convent contained 
forty -two professed, and two novices ; their aca- 
demy sixty-five boarders ; their free-school, one 
hundred and forty pupils ; and their hospital, 
one hundred and four patients."^ 



CHAPTER IV. 

The Ursuline Convent of JYew Orleans — Mother 
Mary Tranchepain de Saint Augustin — 
Their hospital and asylums — Filiation of 
this house — Convents of Havana — Convents 
of Galveston and San Antonio. 

When the colony of Louisiana was at last es- 
tablished in a permanent form, Father de Beau- 
bois, an excellent Jesuit missionary, who had 
already labored for some years in Illinois, set 
out for France, to obtain, if possible, subjects 
and means to found at New Orleans an estab- 
lishment of his own order, and a house of Ur- 
suline nuns. His zeal for God's glory was not 
fruitless, he addressed himself to an Ursuline 
of unbounded zeal. Mother Marie Tranchepain 
de St. Augustin, one of those heroic souls 

* De Courcj, Lea Servantes de Dieu en Canada. ^Q, 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 201 



whom God so often draws from tlie midst of 
heresy, and in spite of obstacles of every kind, 
they succeeded by the assistance of Mother 
Catherine de Beausobre de St. Amant, superior 
of the Ursulines of France, in arranging with 
the West India Company the treaty of founda- 
tion, and obtained the royal approbation for the 
new convent.* Some Bishops opposed the pro- 
ject, but at last, on the 12th of January, 1727, 
Mother Marie Tranchepain de St. Augustin, a 
convert, who had been confirmed as Superior by 
the Bishop of Quebec, assembled around her in 
the infirmary of Hennebon, Sister Margaret 
Judde de St. Jean FEvangeliste, and Sister 
Marianne Boulanger de St. Angelique, both of 
the community of Rouen ; Sister Magdalen de 
Mahieu de St. Frangois Xavier, of that of Havre ; 
Sister Renee Guiguel de St. Marie, from that of 
Vannes ; Sister Margaret de Salaon de St. The- 
rese, of that of Ploermel ; Sister Cecilia Cave- 
lier de St. Joseph, from that of Elboeuf ; and 
Sister Marianne Dain, of the house of Henne- 
bon, with the novice Marie Hachard de St. 
Stanislas, and two lay sisters, all except Sister 
St. Mary of the congregation of Paris, which she 
also joined.f 

^ The Royal approbation is dated September 18, 1726. 
JSrevet enfaveur des Religeuses Ursulines de la Louisiane 
t Cronique des Ursulines de la Nouvelle Orleans. Ms, 



202 LIFE OP 



They embarked at L'Orient on the 22nd of 
February, in the same vessel with Fathers Dou- 
trebau and Tartarin, Jesuit missionaries, des- 
tined also for Louisiana. Their voyage was one 
of danger and misfortunes, and also of hardship, 
for they suffered much from the brutal treat- 
ment of the captain, and after being tossed by 
tempests, driven into Madeira, chased by pirates, 
they ran ashore, soon after entering the gulf, and 
reached the port of Balize, at the mouth of the 
Mississippi, only on the 23rd of July, five months 
after their departure. While landing here they 
were all nearly drowned, as a storm came on at 
a moment when their boats were heavily laden 
and the sailors intoxicated : after reaching land 
they received letters from Father de Beaubois, 
who was impatiently awaiting their arrival, and 
had prepared a residence for them. They ac- 
cordingly embarked in periauguas, and on the 
6th of August reached New Orleans and took 
possession of a house hired for them by the 
company.'^ 

By the treaty concluded between the Ursu- 
lines and the company, the latter were to build 
a monastery, to maintain six religious, and pay 

* Relation du Voyage des fondatrices de la Nouvelle 
Orleans ecrit« aux Ursulines de France, par la Mere St. 
Augustin. Ms. Lettres Circulaires. Ms. 



SAINT A2^GELA MERICI. 203 



their passage and that of four servants ; the 
Ursulines undertaking to direct the military 
hospital and poor schools. In accordance with 
this agreement the company began to erect a 
monastery, but the work was neglected, and six 
years elapsed before it was ready to receive 
them. Exposed as they were to great inconve- 
nience, the good Sisters bore up against these 
trials and devoted themselves to the faithful 
observance of their holy rule. 

While thus situated they were at a distance 
from the hospital, and unable to attend it, but 
they took charge of orphans, opened a school, 
and undertook the instruction of poor children.* 
A number of orphans claimed their motherly 
care almost immediately after their arrival. 
The Natchez, a powerful tribe of Indians, who 
dwelt where the city of that name now stands, 
provoked by the tyranny of Chopart, the com- 
mandant of the neighboring French post, rose 
in 1728, and massacreing the men, reduced the 
women and children to slavery. Many of the 
latter were rescued, and the orphans confided 
to the care of the Ursulines. Father Le Petit, 

* Dumont in Louisiana, Hist. Coll. v. 26. Gayarre, His- 
toire de la Louisiane, i. 223. Id. Louisiana, its Colonial 
History, 384. Charlevoix, Histoire de la Nouvelle France, 
iv. 239. 



204 LIFE OF 



in his letter of July 12th, 1730, thus speaks of 
them : ^' The little girls whom none of the in- 
habitants wish to adopt, have greatly enlarged 
the interesting company of orphans whom the 
nuns are bringing up. The great number of 
these children only serves to increase their 
charity and attention. They have formed them 
into a separate class, and have appointed two 
special matrons for their care. There is not 
one of this holy sisterhood but is delighted at 
having crossed the ocean, nor do they seek here 
any other happiness than that of preserving 
those children in their innocence, and giving a 
polite and Christian education to these young 
French girls, who are in danger of being almost 
as degraded as the slaves. We may hope, with 
regard to these holy women, that before the end 
of the year they will occupy the new mansion 
which is intended for them, and for which they 
have waited so long. Once settled there they 
will add to the instruction of the boarders, 
day scholars, orphans and colored women, the 
care of the sick in the hospital, and of an asylum 
for penitent women. ... So many works of 
charity would in France be sufficient to occupy 
many associations, and different institutions. 
But what cannot zeal effect ? These different 
labors do not terrify seven Ursulines, and by 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 205 



God's grace they accomplish them without in- 
terfering with the observance of their rule. 
Yet for my own part I fear greatly, that unless 
assistants arrive, they will succumb beneath the 
hardship. Those who Iiere ignorantly said at 
first that the nuns came too soon, and too many, 
have changed their language and ideas : wit- 
nessing their edifying lives and their immense 
service to the colony, they find now that they 
did not arrive soon enough, and that too many, 
of their virtue and merit, cannot come."^ 

The next year Father D'Avaugour, the pro- 
curator of the Jesuit missions in Louisiana, 
presented a memorial to the government, in 
which he detailed the advantages of the insti- 
tution, and besought the government to send 
six additional Sisters, and to grant the convent 
at New Orleans the privileges which the order 
enjoyed in France. f 

A few years later while laboring, as best they 
could, for their own salvation and the temporal 
and spiritual works of mercy which they had 
undertaken, so far as their temporary accom- 
modations permitted, the community beheld 
three of its dear members taken from them by 

* Lettres Edifiantes et Curienses — xx, 100. Kip's Jesuit 

Missions, p. 301. 

f Louisiana Historical Collections, i, 68. 

18 



206 LIFE OP 



death, the saintly Sister Magdalen of St. Fran- 
cis Xavier, Sister Margaret de St. Therese, and 
Sister Margaret de St. Jean. A more severe 
blow awaited them still : she who had been 
their directress, guide and mother, their beloved 
Superior, expired amid her remaining children 
in November, 1733. 

Chosen by God's mercy from the very centre 
of a Protestant family and Protestant society, 
Mile. Tranchepain felt herself drawn to the 
faith, and yielding to the attraction of grace, 
made her abjuration at the Ursuline Convent at 
Rouen, in which some years later, (1699,) she 
was received as a novice. Her most ardent wish 
was to be sent on some foreign mission, but she 
learnt interiorly that this favor was only to be 
purchased by crosses of every kind. Her joyful 
acceptance of Father Beaubois' offer was in full 
consciousness of -the trials that awaited her : 
and few could have triumphed over so many ob- 
stacles as she did in gathering companions 
around her and in reaching the Mississippi. 
Her piety, however, was tender and solid ; her 
faith and hope unmovable, and her charity all- 
embracing. She possessed, too, in an eminent 
degree, all the qualities necessary for a Supe- 
rior, and all that is needed to make one re- 
spected even by those whom virtue touches the 



'saint ANGELA MERICI. 207 



least. Her mind was quick and penetrating, 
her manners accomplished, her conversation 
lively, but always seasoned with holy thoughts. 
On Saint Ursulas' day, in 1733, she was seized 
with violent pains and vomiting, but did not 
yield to the violence of the disease or cease 
from performing her regular duties* In an- 
other day, however, she was entirely prostrated, 
and unable to leave her couch : she now pre- 
pared for her last passage, and having been 
permitted to receive the last sacraments from 
the hands of her holy director. Father de Beau- 
bois, she died after an illness of eighteen days. 
On the 17th of July, 1734, the Ursulines, 
whose numbers had been increased by new ar- 
rivals, and who were now directed by Mother 
St. Andre, a professed Sister from Caen, took 
possession of their new house, a brick convent, 
which still subsists on Conde street, between 
Barrack and Hospital. The ceremony was one 
of great pomp and solemnity : the Governor, 
with his staff, the civil and military officers, 
and the troops, all taking part in the proces- 
sion. Nine religious entered the new monas- 
tery, but of these only three were of the number 
of the original founders ; Mother St. Mary of 
Vannes, Mother St. Joseph of Elboeuf, and 
Mother St. Stanislas, undeterred by the death 



208 LIFE OP 



of the others, and the return of one more, had 
preserved, and joined by others from Caen, 
Bayeux and Dieppe, and by postulants in the 
colony itself, now saw all their hopes realized.* 

The hospital was not quite finished, but the 
sick were transported to it on the 26th of Au- 
gust, and the nuns took charge of them, as well 
as of the orphans. Sister St. Xavier having the 
honor of being the first hospitaliere^ Fifty sick 
soldiers soon demanded their care, and it was 
never wanting. 

The children of the hapless Acadians soon 
after called for their care, and their house was 
open to the afliicted, receiving the orphans 
whom England had robbed of parents. One 
of these, Mary Blanc, remained as portress in 
the house, and lived more than a century, al- 
most to our own day. 

The Sisters were compelled, however, to go 
to great expense to make their building suita- 
ble for their purposes, so carelessly had it been 
erected by the interested contractors. 

Troubles occurred about the middle of the 
last century, at New Orleans, between the vari- 

* The first American was the lay sister Mary Turpin de 
St. Marthe, born in lUinois, of a Canadian father and an 
Indian mother. After a life of great piety she died in 1761, 
at the age of fifty-two. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 209 



ous ecclesiastics there, and the Ursulines, to 
their regret, beheld the venerable Father Beau- 
bois suspended : the Bishop of Quebec, unable 
from the great distance to visit New Orleans, 
or obtain exact information, could only sj^mpa- 
thise with the good nuns. When Louis XV. 
basely yielded his possessions in America to 
Britain and Spain, the Bishop of Quebec re- 
joiced to see New Orleans pass under the pro- 
tection of a Catholic power, and congratulated 
the excellent nuns on being now subject to the 
Bishop of Havana, hoping that a remedy would 
at last be brought to the evils under which they 
had so long suffered.*^ 

Soon after the cession, however, several Sis- 
ters died, and in consequence of the small num- 
ber of nuns and the diJEculty of obtaining others 
from France, while trade was interdicted, they 
were compelled to relinquish the care of the 
military hospital on the first of January, 1770. 
Some years after, Mother Marie Therese Lan- 
delle de St. Jacques, who was fifteen years Su- 
perior during her last term, begged some French 
clergymen returning home, to obtain, if possi- 
ble, some Sisters from that country, and also 
wrote in 1783, to a Jesuit missionary in France, 

* Lettre de Mgr. Briandy for which I am indebted to H. 
de Courcy, Esq. 

18* 



210 LIFE OF 



who had long been in Louisiana. The latter 
applied at once to the Ursuline Convent of the 
Presentation of our lady at Pont St. Esprit. 
Sister Mary Theresa Farjon, a native of the en- 
virons of Avignon, known as Mother St. Francis 
Xavier, on hearing the letter read, offered to 
go, and was joined by two young Sisters, St. 
Felicite and St. Andre. They left their con- 
vent on the 25th of September, 1785, little sup- 
posing that in a few years it would be all deso- 
late, £*id on the 11th of February, 1786, reached 
New Orleans. Here a sudden trouble arose. 
Mother St. Monica, a Spanish religious, was 
Superior: she refused to receive the French 
Sisters, and showed a letter Irom the Rt. Rev. 
Cyril de Tricaly, Bishop of Havana, ordering 
them to be ranked after all the other professed. 
To this. Mother St. Francis Xavier and her 
companions submitted, but a new letter of the 
Bishop, condemning Mother St. Jacques, an- 
nounced that the Sisters must await the order 
of the Spanish court. The king of Spain had, 
however, already approved their going, and or- 
dered their proper rank to be assigned to 
them. 

During the succeeding years of the Spanish 
rule, the convent enjoyed great peace and pros- 
perity; and a wealthy gentleman named Almo- 



SAIXT ANGELA MERICI. 211 



naster, built them, at his own expense, a church, 
choir and day-school for their use."^ 

Another change of government, however, soon 
followed. The French revolution had annihi- 
lated the sanctuaries of religion in Franco, and 
ere long brought Spain to a state bordering on 
dependence. Forced by circumstances, Spain 
in 1802 ceded back to France the colony of 
Louisiana. The news of this cession filled the 
nuns at New Orleans with alarm : all consid- 
ered their dispersion certain, and some saw no 
alternative but to sell all and provide means of 
support: and of nineteen professed, only six 
were willing to remain even if the French gov- 
ernment would protect them, the rest wished the 
property sold and their dowries returned to en- 
able them to go to Havana. The prefect, Mr. 
Laussat, arrived on the 26th of March, 1803, 
and calmed all fears by declaring that the Sis- 
ters might lay aside all fear, that they could re- 
main undisturbed as they were. The city 
flocked to the convent to congratulate them, but 
the Spanish party still wished to leave, and as 
the Marquis de Cascalavo, the commissioner of 
his Catholic majesty, declared that the king 
would support such as chose to go to Havana, 
Mother St. Monica, the Superior, Sisters St. 

* Annales de la Propagation de la Foi. I, ii, 46. 



212 LIFE OF 



Augustine, Michael, Raphael, Aloysius Gonza- 
ga, Ursula, Clare and Rose, natives of Spain or 
Spanish America; Mother St. Ignatius, a French 
woman ; Sisters St. Solange and Avoye, Louisi- 
anians ; and Sister St. Angela, a native of 
Scotland, with four lay sisters, departed through 
the church door on the 29th of May, 1803. Six 
months after the French prefect transferred the 
colony to the United States, and the remaining 
Sisters thus pa&sed under a new and un-Catho- 
lie government. 

At this epoch the community consisted only 
of Mothers St. Xavier, Superior, St. Felicite, 
depositary, and St. Andre, all three professed 
of the Ursulines of the Presentation of Our 
Lady, Mothers St. Mary, assistant, St. Scholas- 
tica and St. Charles, natives of this country, 
and two lay sisters. They had, however, not- 
withstanding their number, never ceased their 
labors, singing their office in choir, taking care 
of the orphans, conducting the school, and on 
Sundays and holidays instructing the colored 
people, for the priests were so few that but for 
these good nuns the negresses would have been 
as vicious and ignorant as in many parts of the 
country of English origin. 

A new trouble now arose, for it was openly 
announced that the new government would not 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 213 



permit the nuns to receive any novices in fu- 
ture, and that on the death of the last survivor, 
the State would take possession of their con- 
vent.* Alarmed at this, Mother St. Xavier ad- 
dressed a letter to Bishop Carroll, and encou- 
raged by him, appealed, with her eleven Sister?, 
for more had joined her, in 1804, to Thomas 
JeflPerson, then President of the United States, 
asking a legislative confirmation of their title, 
not for their own sake, but for those in whose 
cause they labored ; Governor Olayborne, of 
Louisiana, had already assured them that they 
should not be disturbed, and the President him- 
self in a letter to them, assured the ** Holy Sis- 
ters," for so he styled them, that*' the principles 
of the constitution and the government of the 
United States were a sure guarantee that their 
convent would be preserved to them sacred and 
inviolate-" Tne Secretary of State, James 
Madison, also wrote to Bishop Carroll, express- 
ing the most kindly sentiments ; but the Ursu- 
lines did not attain their object, and being 
subsequently subjected to annoyance, applied 
to the Louisiana legislature, and obtained a 
statute confirming their privileges and immu- 
nities. 
Mother St. Xavier, anxious to increase the 

* Ashe's Travels. 



214 LIFE OP 



iramber of lier community, had written to 
France to the dispersed members of her old 
convent, urgently inviting them to come to her 
aid, and above all, to Sister de St. Michael 
Gensoul, then at Marseilles. That devout nun 
then conducted a school, and having obtained 
twelve young ladies to join her, sought to pro- 
ceed to New Orleans, but her bishop opposed 
it, and it was only by applying to his holiness, 
Pope Pius YII., in 1809, under the invocation 
of Our Lady of Prompt Succor, to whom she 
had great devotion, that she obtained the ne- 
cessary permission. "His Holiness/' says 
Cardinal di Pietro, in reply, "formally ap- 
proves your condescension to the repeated in- 
vitations of your dear sisters in Louisiana, and 
the desires of the estimable proselytes, whom^ 
by divine grace, you have inspired with so 
lively an ardor for so excellent a vocation." 
Thus encouraged, Mother Gensoul sailed to 
New Orleans, and arrived there on the 30th of 
December, 1810, with seven postulants, one of 
whom was Mother St. Yincent, so remarkable 
for her humility. It was indeed a day of joy 
and happiness to the little community, which 
could not sufficiently thank God for so great a 
grace. 

This house had been founded, as we have 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 215 



seen, by the Ursulines of Paris, but now all 
the elder religious were of the congregation of 
the Presentation of Our Lady, and naturally 
preferred its rule, which was indeed better 
adapted to the necessities of the convent, not 
obliging the Sisters to chant the divine office 
in choir* They accordingly applied to Bishop 
Dubourg, then administrator of the diocese, for 
leave to take the title of Presentation of Our 
Lady, and adopt its rules with some modifica- 
tions. To this, after mature deliberation, he 
consented, and the change was finally effected 
on the 16th of January, 1813. 

When the English army was advancing on 
New Orleans to the cry of" booty and beauty," 
in 1815, the nuns placed on their altar the 
** statute of Our Lady of Prompt Succor/' which 
Mother Gensoul had had blessed in her time of 
trial in France, and had brought with her. 
Around this token of divine favor they, with 
many of the pious of the city, ladies and poor 
negressGS, knelt, imploring the God of armies 
to bless the American cause, and nerve the arm 
of our soldiers. After the illustrious Jackson 
had repulsed, with slaughter, the foreign in- 
vader, the daughters of St. Angela turned their 
school rooms into an hospital for the sick and 
wounded soldiers, and for three months lavished 
on them every care. 



216 LIFE OP 



Insensible to this, a judge wished to compel 
some of the community to appear as witnesses 
in court: in vain the Ursulines pleaded their 
rights guaranteed by treaties; they were fined 
for contempt of court ! Mother Gensoul applied 
to the legislature, and on the 23d of January, 
1818, an act was passed guaranteeing their 
rights and privileges, and prescribing the mode 
in which their depositions should be taken. 

Meanwhile, Bishop Dubourg, then in Prance, 
sought postulants for their house, and the nun?^ 
to their great joy, beheld nine arrive in Janu- 
ary, 1817. Yet a schism then distracted the 
Catholics of New Orleans, and the Ursulines 
were abuut to abandon it, but consoled by a 
letter from Pope Pius VII. himself, remained. 

The city had ere long grown around their 
convent: its precincts were repeatedly invaded, 
especially from a neighboring military hospital, 
and in spite of their appeals to government the 
evil augmented. To complete their embarrass- 
ment, a street w^as run through their grounds 
in 1821. On this they resolved to erect a new 
convent elsewhere, and selecting a spot three 
miles below the city, built their present house, 
into which they entered in September, 1824, 
one aged religious, who had not passed out of 
her cloister since her entrance into it in 1766, 
weeping all the way. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 217 



Meanwhile their numbers increased, so that 
in 1822 there were fifteen or sixteen professed, 
and a number of novices and postulants,"^ but 
as Bishop Dubourg remarked in a letter to the 
Rt. Eev. J. 0. Plessis, bishop of Quebec : '' The 
house, in point of numbers, might seem now to 
give no cause of alarm ; but when I consider 
the age of the ancient pillars of that edifice, 
and that at the moment, perhaps not remote, of 
their fall, there will remain only feeble reeds 
to replace them, I cannot be tranquil as to the 
consequences." Anxious to save from extinc- 
tion a house which he styled elsewhere the 
'' base of religion in Louisiana," the bishop of 
New Orleans called upon the Ursulines of Que^ 
bee to aid their sister convent. '^It would 
seem indispensably necessary to draw here three 
or four nuns, already professed, of mature age, 
of tried judgment and virtue, who would fill up 
the interval which separates the old from the 
young." The daughters of Mother Mary of the 
Incarnation responded to their call, and on the 
5th of December, 1823, the convent at New 
Orleans welcomed the arrival of Sisters Felicite 
Borne de St. Charles, Mary Angelique Bougie 

* De Courcy. Les Servantes de Dieu en Canada — ^Mon- 
treal, 1855, p. 28. 

19 



218 LIFE OF 



de St. Louis Gonzague, and Marie Pelagie 
Morin de St. Etienne.^ 

Since that time the convent has continued in 
great prosperity : educating rich and poor, and 
affording a home to the orphan, for though the 
city erected an asylum in December, 1824, the 
convent still supports many. Since its founda- 
tion it has had eighteen Superiors ; eighty 4hree 
professions have been made in it; and thirty- 
six have joined it from other houses : sixty-three 
have died, eleven of whom exceeded the age of 
eighty. The community now under the worthy 
Mother St. Seraphine, who has been eighteen 
years superior, consists of thirty-four members, 
twenty-one choir nuns, and one novice ; ten lay 
sisters and one novice. Their school contains 
generally over a hundred boarders, and at least 
thirty-four or forty ophans. Their chaplain 
and spiritual guide is the well-known and ex- 
cellent Abbe Perche.f 

The ancient house of New Orleans has not 
been a fruitless mother: other monasteries of the 
order of St. Ursula have been founded by its 

* Annales de la Propagation de la Foi. I. i. 25. Laity's 
Directory, 1822, p. 113. 

f For the most importaut facts in relation to this house, 
the writer is indebted to the kindness of Mother St. Sera- 
phine, the worthy superior. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 219 



instrumentality, and are to some extent filiations 
of the monastery which rose on the banks of 
the river of the Immaculate Conception. 

We have already seen how the large and 
prosperous community of Ursulines at Havana, 
in the island of Cuba, was formed by some mem- 
bers of the house at New Orleans. It is more 
properly a division than a filiation of that mo- 
nastery. The nineteen Sisters who retired 
reached Havana on the 23rd of June, 1803, and 
were cordially welcomed by the Rt. Rev. Juan 
Jose Diaz de Espada i Landa, then Bishop of 
Havana. As no residence had been prepared 
for them, the Ursulines were at first distributed 
in the three convents of the city, and remained 
there till the 4th of April, 1804, when, with due 
solemnity, they entered their present convent"^ 

When Texas ceased to be a part of Mexico, 
and was erected into a vicariate apostolic in 
1842, Bishop Odin saw the necessity of a reli- 
gious community to educate the youth, and in 
1846 applied to the Ursulines of New Orleans 
for a colony of their order. The daughters of 
Saint Angela cheerfully consented to aid him, 
and on the 16th of January, 1847, five professed 
Sisters and three novices, with Mother St. Ar- 

* Information from the prioress of the convent at Ha- 
vana, through Miss C. Ramirez. 



220 LIFE OP 



sene as Superior, set out for Galveston, where 
the Bishop had purchased a fine edifice for their 
use.'^ The little community was soon unequal 
to tlie labors developed upon them, and the 
good Bishop appealed to the ancient convent 
of Quebec for assistance. Two nuns were 
granted to his entreaty. 

In 1852, the same Prelate, now Bishop of 
Galveston^ erected a convenient building at San 
Antonio, for a new convent of the order, and 
in the following year, a colony from New Or- 
leans, with two nuns from the house in Water- 
ford Ireland, numbering in all nine professed 
Sisters, two novices, and two postulants, estab- 
lished this new convent of Saint Ursula.f 

^ U. S. Catholic Magazine, vi, 165. Catholic Almanacs 
1847, p. 91 ; 1848, p. 119. U. S. C. 
t Almanac 1851, p. 185 ; 1853, p. 13S 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 221 



BOOK VI. 



CHAPTER I. 

The Irish Ursulines — Miss Jfano JYagle — Con- 
vtnt of Black Rock, Cork — Filiations in Ire- 
land — In the United States — The Convent in 
JVew York — The Convent in Charleston — Its 
removals. 

The soil of Ireland was once covered with 
monasteries and convents. The holy virgin of 
Kildare, Saint Bridget, in the life-time of Saint 
Patrick, founded an order of religious women, 
which soon spread over the island. These abodes 
of piety and sanctity flourished through every 
change, amid civil war and foreign invasion, till 
the English entered Ireland. Then in the name 
of religion they were seized, and closed on the 
Irish race. No monastery, no convent could 
open its doors to receive a native novice^ Re- 
ligion thus schismatized by the English, was 
overthrown at last by the formal schism of 
Henry VIIL, and by the establishment of the 
Church of England under the regent Somerset. 
Then the religious houses which ^^ad beei) es- 

19* 



222 LIFE OF 



tablished of various orders, and into which the 
Irish had, in spite of law entered, were sup- 
pressed. The Irish Catholic could embrace the 
religions state only on the continent. Houses 
of the orders which supplied the missionaries 
for this nation, were indeed erected on the con- 
tinent, but few, if any convents for Irish 
women. 

In the designs of Providence, it was reserved 
to the order founded by Saint Angela Merici, 
and by her placed under the patronage of the 
illustrious Saint Ursula, a martyr, of the same 
race as the apostle of Ireland, — it was reserved 
to this order to restore to the country which 
Saint Patrick had evangelized, houses where 
the virgins whom God inspired to devote their 
lives to perfection and retirement, might follow 
their vocation without being compelled, like 
Saint Ursula and her companions, to fly beyond 
the sea from the face of the Anglo-Saxon. 

The events which led to this happy result 
were, as often happens, to all human appear- 
ances, mere accidents. A young Irish lady, 
educated at Paris, and mingling in the gay 
company of that Capital, after spending one 
night at a fashionable party, was returning 
home at an early hour in the morning when 
she suddenly came upon a crowd of poor people 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 223 



waiting at a church door, not yet opened, for 
the first mass. Their simple piety, so far re- 
moved from her gay, fashionable career, filled 
her with self-reproach. She resolved to retire 
from the world, and devote herself to the in- 
struction of the poor. This resolution, formed 
in a moment of compunction, was not a mere 
passing volition, as often happens. She became 
the foundress of the Irish Ursulines. 

Miss Nano Nagle, for we write of her, was 
born in 1728, at Bally-griffin, the family seat of 
her fore-fathers, on the banks of the Blackwater. 
After giving her such instruction as his own 
house could afford, her father, Garrett Nagle, 
sent her to Paris to complete her education ; and 
at its close, she remained a few years in that 
city. The events of which we have now spoken, 
caused her return in 1750, and her fidelity to the 
inspiration of grace was seen in her instructing 
and catechising the children in the neighbor- 
hood of her father^s mansion. She found the 
ignorance of the people extreme. Penal laws, 
the scarcity of Priests, the absence of schools, 
the allurements of heresy, all had contributed 
to bring about a state of things which grieved 
her very heart. Unable, for want of means, 
for she was not yet in possession of any heredi- 
tary property, she could not remedy the evil. 



224 LIFE OP 



and resolved to retire to some religious house 
on the continent. But she could not forget 
Ireland, and enlightened directors at Paris as- 
sured her that her vocation was to labor for the 
spiritual regeneration of the poor of her own 
country. 

Returning once more to Ireland, she found 
herself enabled, in consequence of her father's 
death, to carry out her plans. Her mother and 
sister encouraged them, and Miss Nagle opened 
her first school in Dublin, where a momentary 
relaxation of the diabolical penal laws permitted 
her to do so unchecked. After conducting it for 
gome time, the death of her mother and sister 
left her alone in Dublin, and she then returned 
to Cork. Here unknown, even to her own fa- 
mily, she secretly opened a school ; it soon con- 
tained two-hundred girls. Her friends, and 
others, from whom she had expected great op- 
position, now encouraged a project so evidently 
successful, and Miss Nagle soon had under her 
direction two schools for boys and five for girls 
in various parts of the city, all well provided 
with competent teachers, and crowded with pu- 
pils. She herself explained the catechism in 
one of the schools every day, and always pre- 
pared the children for their first communion. 
Often she spent the greater part of the after- 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 225 



noon teaching children to say their prayers^ and 
on cold, dark winter nights might be seen, lan- 
tern in hand, picking her way homeward. Her 
health had been impaired, but God, who reserved 
her for so great things for his glory, allowed 
it now to stand any hardship. 

The great work in which she was engaged 
depended solely on her, and she wished to give 
it permanence by confiding it to a religious 
order. By the advice of the Rev. Father 
Doran, of the Society, and his nephew, the 
Rev. Francis Moylan,"^ she resolved to solicit a 
colony of Ursulines from Paris. Mr. Moylan 
visited that capital : several nuns offered to go 
and found the new house, but the Superiors re- 
fused permission. They deemed Ireland too 
insecure for a convent. How little did they 
imagine that in less than twenty-five years, 
their whole community would be scattered, 
vainly seeking refuge, and never to re-unite ! 
Failing in this attempt, it was now proposed 
that four Irish ladies. Miss Fitzsimmons, then 
actually in Paris, Misses Coppinger, Nagle and 
Kavanagh, should enter the novitiate at Saint 
Jacques, and after the usual term of probation, 

* Afterwards Bishop of Cork in 1785. He was brother 
to Stephen Moylan, Washington's Qnarter Master General 
during the Revolution. 



226 LIFE OF 



return to Ireland with professed nuns to or- 
ganize the new convent. These ladies accord- 
ingly entered among the Ursulines of Paris on 
the 5th of September, 1769. At the close of 
their novitiate, no Ursuline of Paris would ac- 
company them ; but Mother Margaret Kelly, of 
the convent of Dieppe, herself a native of Ire- 
land, hearing of the difficulty, agreed to assist 
them. This little colony, consisting of Mother 
Kelly, Sister Angela Fitzsimmons, Sister Au- 
gustine Coppinger, Sister Joseph Nagle, and 
Sister Ursula Kavanagh, accordingly sailed 
from Havre, and reaching Cork, entered the 
convent prepared for them on the 18th of Sep- 
tember, 1771. having been already joined by 
Miss Louisa Moylan, and Miss Lawless. 

A bull was obtained from Pope Clement XIY., 
dated January 13th, 1773, by which the monas- 
tery was formally established, and the first 
twelve novices permitted to take their vows 
after one year's probation. Three of the Sis- 
ters accordingly made their profession on the 
loth of February, 1774, and Sister Coppinger, 
who had been prevented by illness, on the 31st 
of January, 1775, preceded by Sister Moylan. 
Mother Coppinger was elected Superior, and the 
community completely oganized, although they 
did not openly assume the habit till more than 
four years later. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 227 



The Ursulines assumed the charge of Miss 
Nagle's schools, but as they soon opened a school 
for higher instruction, Miss Nagle conceived 
that they did not realize the object of her great 
desires. She did not enter the order which she 
had been so instrumental in bestowing on Ire- 
land, but collecting other devoted ladies around 
her, founded the Sisters of the Presentation, a 
congregation approved by the Holy See in Sep- 
tember, 1791. In this order. Mother Nagle 
died on the 26th of April, 1784, closing a life 
of active and energetic charity by a most holy 
death. 

The Ursuline convent of Cork thus founded 
in 1771, was some years after removed to the 
picturesque village of Blackrock, near that city, 
and has ever since continued to impart to rich 
and poor the blessings of a Christian educa- 
tion."^ The nuns have also contributed greatly 
to English Catholic literature, so sadly deficient 
in our day. The books of devotion, religious 
biographies, and especially the class books 
compiled by them, have carried their apostolate 
wherever the English language is spoken. 

^ Neither Brennan's nor Walsh's Ecclesiastical History 
of Ireland makes any mention of the Irish Ursulines. The 
above account is drawn mainly from the Dublin Review 
for December, 1843. See also the memoir of Sister Mary 
Joseph Regis. Dublin, 1855. 



228 LIFE OF 



The Institute of Saint Angela was not con- 
fined in Ireland to this one convent. The house 
at Cork has been a fruitful mother, and has 
filiations at Waterford, Thurles and Sligo, in 
Ireland, and one of recent origin at Demerara, 
in South America. Two filiations from this 
branch of the congregation of Paris have ex- 
isted in the United States, but they did not 
attain permanence. The first colony returned 
to Ireland ; the second, unable to maintain its 
separate existence, dissolved, the Sisters enter- 
ing other houses of the order. 

The former of these was at New York. 
Early in the present century, Father Anthony 
Kohlmann, a most holy and learned member of 
the Society of Jesus, was sent by Archbishop 
Carroll as Vicar-General of New York, and he 
was for a time administrator of the newly 
created See of that name. There he restored 
religion, renewed the piety of the faithful, and 
in every way sought to advance the cause of 
God. Having founded a college for boys where 
members of his own Society, under the direction 
of Father Benedict Fenwick, trained them to 
science and piety, he resolved to procure mem- 
bers of some religious order of women to open 
an academy for girls. The foundations of Miss 
Nagle were not unknown to him, and he wrote 



SAIXT ANGELA MERICI. 229 



to Fatner JJetagh, a celebrated Irish Jesuit, to 
obtain for him, if possible, some Ursuline nuns 
to begin a house at New York, intending sub- 
sequently to send for some of the Presentation 
Sisters to conduct the poor schools and open an 
orphan asylum. The Ursulines of Cork did not 
shrink from the perils of crossing the Atlantic, 
and in 1812, three choir religious, Mothers Mary 
Anne (Christina Fagen), Mary Frances de Chan- 
tal (Sarah Walsh), and Mary Paul (Mary Bald- 
win), sailed from Cork in the vessel of a Catho- 
lic captain, and reached New York on the 7th 
of April. They were joyfully welcomed by 
Father Kohlmann, and by the Catholics gene- 
rally, and after opening a school were incorpo- 
rated by the legislature of the State. Ladies 
of such talent and polished manners, full of the 
spirit of their institute, and zealous to do good, 
soon won the general esteem. Their academy 
flourished, but no postulants joined them, and 
as it had been a condition that their stay should 
be for only three years, unless joined by ladies 
of the country, they finally closed their house, 
and, to the great regret of the Catholics, re- 
turned to Ireland.* 

*De Courcj's Catholic Churcli in the United States, p. 
875. Bishop Bayley's Sketch of the Catholic Church in 
New York, p. 64 ; and private letters. 

20 



230 LIFE OF 



Several years later the second filiation was 
formed at Charleston, in South Carolina. The 
Rt. Rev. John England, of Cork, had been ap 
pointed the first Bishop of this new see, and on 
taking possession of it, found his diocese in a 
most destitute state, especially in point of edu- 
cation. His thoughts turned at once to the 
Ursulines of Cork, whom he well knew during 
his ministry in that city. Years, however, 
elapsed before he could prepare for their 
coming. At last in 1834 he visited Ireland, 
and having made known his request, the ladies 
thought fit were consulted,. and in a few days 
Mother Mary Charles, (Christina Molony,) Sis- 
ter Mary Borgia, (M. A. Isabella McCarthy,) 
and Sister Mary Antonia, (Mary Hughes,) all 
professed sisters, with Miss Woulfe as a postu- 
lant; prepared to go. They left the convent on 
the 27th of September, and proceeding to 
Liverpool, embarked for Philadelphia. . On the 
10th of December they entered their monastery 
in Charleston, and electing Mother Mary 
Charles as Superior, founded the fourth Ursu- 
line Convent in the United States. Mother 
Mary Charles was a woman of fine and highly 
cultivated intellect, fervent zeal, and elevated 
virtue. The house met with difficulties at first, 
and was sptoiI from being closed only by her 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 231 



exertion : she at last placed it on a firm basis, 
and the Ursulines began their apostolate in 
Charleston. The academy which they opened 
soon acquired a high character, and the house 
increased in prosperity, till the heavy blow 
caused by the death of the holy and able supe- 
rior, who expired on the 28th of July, 1837, 
after a life of eminent usefulness in her order 
here and in Ireland.^ *' In Charleston she 
specially exhorted her sisters, and herself assi- 
duously gave the example, to seek in a particu- 
lar manner for the females who had been most 
neglected, and to attend to the catechetical in- 
struction of the children. Hence she was gene- 
rally to be found with the females of color, and 
surrounded by the children of every hue who 
were preparing for their first communion." 

Under the subsequent superiors. Mother 
Mary Borgia and Mary Joseph de Sales, 
(Woulfe,) the house continued its labors and 
obtained of the legislature an act of incorpora- 
tion, but in 1847, for causes which have not 
reached us, they resolved to leave Charleston, 
and proceeded to Covington, Kentucky, but 
the next year crossed the river to Cincinnati. 
Here they opened an academy, and for several 

* See a memoir of her by Bishop England in his works 
ill. 263. 



232 LIFE OF 



years rendered great service to religion; but 
in 1854 the community, then numbering twelve, 
for cogent reasons resolved to disband, and are 
at present like those of Oharlestown, scattered 
in different houses of their order, five choir 
nuns and four lay sisters entering that of which 
we are now to speak. 



CHAPTER II. 

The Ursuline Convent at Boston and Charles- 
town — Its founder J the Rev. John Thayer — 
The Ryan family — The foundation of the 
house — Death of the two Misses Ryan — Dif 
ficulties of the house — The riot and destruc- 
tion of the Convent. 

The celebrated house at Charlestown, Mas- 
sachusetts, of which the blackened ruins still 
stand a monument of New England fanatacism, 
is connected in no slight degree with the houses 
in Ireland, inasmuch as its heroic foundresses 
were pupils of the Ursulines of Thu.rles, and as 
their sister and nieces are members of the 
Ursuline community at Sligo. It was, however, 
in fact, a distinct foundation in the United 
States, like the Visitation and Sisters oi 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 233 



Charity, and Mary Catharine and Margaret 
Ryan, with their angelic cousin and martyr 
niece, must ever be enshrined in the memory 
of American Catholics, with Anne Lalor and 
Mother Seton. Strange were the events which 
led to its foundation. 

Soon after the American Revolution, the 
Rev. John Thayer, of Boston, who had gone to 
Rome a Presbyterian clergyman, but converted 
there by the miracles operated at the bier of 
the Venerable Benedict Labre, had returned 
to his native city a Catholic priest, formed the 
design of establishing a community of religious 
women in the United States. Soon after his 
ordination, he had visited the Ursuline Convent 
of Boulogne sur Mer, and several times cele- 
brated mass in their chapel. He here formed 
an acquaintance with their institute, and ever 
after entertained the highest regard for it, re- 
gretting that his own land was not possessed 
of houses of the order. With all his zeal, piety 
and devotedness, he did not escape the censure 
of his companions in the ministry, and although 
employed for a time at Boston, Albany, and in 
Kentucky, was soon left without a mission, 
Bishop Carroll declining to give him a pastor- 
ship. He now resolved to carry out his great 
object of founding a convent, and set out in 

20^ 



234 LIFE OP 



1803 for Europe to solicit the aid of the faith- 
ful ; so new was the plan at that time, that it 
merely drew ridicule upon him from his former 
opponents, but he persevered, and not without 
success."^ He at last, about 1811, took up his 
residence permanently at Limerick, and by his 
zealous labors effected a remarkable change in 
the fervor and piety of the people. In order 
to lead them more effectually to God, he en- 
deavored to make himself all to all, and formed 
a kind friendship and social intercourse with 
several families, whose children he enlightened 
with higher views of piety, leading them to 
the practise of meditation and frequent com- 
munion.f 

In no house was he more cordially received 
than that of Mr. James Ryan, whose two sons 

* Parenty. Notices sur les Monasteres d'Ursulines du 
Nord de la France, et de la Belgique, p. 156. At his visit, 
two sisters, moved by his zeal, offered themselves to God, 
as victims of penance for the conversion of Ai^erica, and 
died soon after. 

f For Mr. Thayer, see Mr. Nagot's account in *' Tableau 
general des principales conversions." Thayer's own ac- 
count and his controversy with Lesslie ; Spalding's 
Sketches of Kentucky. From letters preserved in the 
papers of Bishop Brute, it is evident that the companions 
of Mr. Thayer condemned only "his intemperance of 
speech," his life was irreproachable, and in London and 
in Limerick he was revered as an apostle. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 235 



and five daughters were his most piously dis- 
posed penitents. In his visits to this family, 
he frequently spoke of his conversion, of his 
labors in Boston, of his darling wish to found 
an Ursuline Convent there, and of the refusal 
of the house in Cork to undertake another 
American mission. 

Moved with his description of the spiritual 
wants of New England, two daughters of Mr. 
Ryan, Mary and Catharine, unknown to each 
other, offered Mr. Thayer to go and join his 
convent. Both were fitted by nature and grace 
for the task, and had all the advantages of a 
high and liberal education at the Ursuline Con- 
vent in Thurles.*^ 

After long and assiduous prayer, and offering 
again and again the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, 
the Rev. Mr. Thayer wrote to Bishop Cheverus 
of Boston, enclosing the letters of the two sis- 
ters, and the Rev. Richard Walsh also wrote, 
earnestly recommending them as fit subjects to 
begin the new monastery. Bishop Cheverus 
and his inseparable friend and companion, Dr. 
Matignon, warmly accepted the offer, and de- 
sired them to come without delay, promising to 
make arrangements for their arrival, and for 

* Mary Ryan was bom May 1, 1785, and Catharine Ryan 
Deo. 28, 1794. 



236 LIFE OP 



their performing their novitiate at the house of 
Three Rivers in Canada. Great was the joy 
of the two sisters at this announcement, each 
being in raptures to see that the other was to 
accompany her. Nor was the joy of the Rev. 
Mr. Thayer less ; he immediately began to pre- 
pare for their voyage, but early in 1815 his 
health began to give way, and he expired on 
the 5th of February, in Mr. Ryan's house, 
tended in his last moments by his devoted 
daughters in Christ. This delayed their pro- 
ject for a time, but in the following year they 
were about to sail with the blessing of their 
father, who ceased not to bless God that his 
daughters had been chosen for so great a work, 
when he too was called by God to receive the 
reward of his well-spent life. At last, on the 
4th of May, 1817, Misses Mary and Catharine 
Ryan sailed from Limerick in the ship Victory, 
for Boston, which they reached safely. Bishop 
Cheverus more than realized his most sanguine 
expectations : no father ever welcomed children 
with more paternal affection. Doctor Matignon 
at once proceeded with them to the Ursuline 
Convent in Three Rivers, where they began 
their novitiate, assuming the religious names 
of Sister Mary Joseph and Sister Mary Mag- 
dalen. At the expiration of their noviceship, 



SAINT ANGELA MEKICI. 237 



Dr. Martignon in 1818 went to Three Rivers, 
and escorted them to the convent, which the 
bishop had prepared near his cathedral. Her 
Sister Mary Joseph was appointed superior, 
and organized the little community. The con- 
vent being thus founded, their youngest sister 
Margaret, who had already asked to join her 
sisters, set out to join them, accompanied by 
her cousin, Catharine Molineux, a young and 
pious widow. These sailed first to Quebec, 
and after spending a week there at the Ursu- 
line Convent, proceeded to Boston in Septem- 
ber, 1818. The establishment of a convent in 
New England, at first excited some discussion 
in the public papers, which protested against 
any such institution, but Bishop Cheverus, by 
an exposition of its objects, calmed the public 
mind.*^ 
The community thus augmented, by the ar- 

* Hamon's life of Cardinal Cheverus, translated by 
Walsh, p. 109. This elegant writer errs in saying that 
Bishop Cheverus, applied to a convent of Ursulines and 
obtained a colony from them, and also errs in ascribing 
the raising of the funds to the excellent Cheverus. That 
the latter is due to Mr. Thayer is proved by the letters 
published in the Boston Catholic Observer, and afterwards 
in the United States Catholic Magazine, as well as by the 
letters of Mother Mary Joseph Ursula Quirk, which give a 
fuU account of the rise of the convents. 



238 LIFE OP 



rival of Sister Mary Augustine and Sister Mary 
Angela, for so they are known in the annals of 
their order, received accessions in the country, 
the two first American professed being Sister 
Mary St. John, (Elizabeth Harrison,) and Sister 
Mary Frances, (Catharine Wiseman.)^ In 1822 
the community consisted of a prioress, and six 
sisters with two no vices, t and their school was 
productive of great good. 

The cross, the infallible badge of the elect, 
now appeared : but it was welcomed by the 
loving hearts that glowed with holy zeal to be- 
come victims of love to him who had immolated 
himself for them. The gentle Sister Mary An- 
gela was attacked by a pulmonary disorder, and 
sank under it in 1823: in April, 1825, Sister 
Mary Magdalen gave evident symptoms of rapid 
decline, and while she was lingering on the 
verge of the grave, the Superior, Mother Mary 
Joseph, was similarly attacked, and perceiving 
that her earthly career was about to close, 
wrote earnestly to Quebec to implore the Sisters 
there to send one of their communitv to succeed 
her. Mother Mary Edmond St. George (Mary 
Ursula Mofi'at) was chosen as Superior and pro- 

* Letter from the Ursulines of Quebec, to H. DeCouroy, 
Esq. 

t Laity's Directory, 1822. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 239 



ceeded to Boston, but before she arrived the two 
devoted Sisters in birth and religion had accom- 
plished their earthly career and passed to the 
abode of peace, the holy founders of the convent 
in Boston. A few days after the death of Mother 
j Mary Joseph, Mother Mary Edmond arrived in 

April; 1824,^ and made use of every means to 
i alleviate and soothe the affliction and bereave- 

i ment of the suffering community, particularly 

I of Sister Mary Augustine, the only survivor of 

I the three heroic Sisters. 

The house in Boston was evidently .too con- 
fined, and in 1826, the Ursulines removed to 
Charlestown, where suitable grounds had been 
purchased, and a beautiful convent having been 
erected, to which the name of Mount Benedict 
was given. The academy soon acquired an ex- 
tended reputation, and pupils came from all 
parts of New England, and even from the sou- 
thern states and British provinces : while ladies 
joined the community in numbers sufficient to 
give every hope of its permanence. 

In 1831, however, they charitably received a 
young woman of a silly, romantic turn, who 
soon left them, and began hy insidious tales 
and mysterious hints to excite suspicion as to 
the convent, especially hinting that one of the 

■'*■ Answer to Six Montlis in a Convent, p. 6. 



240 LIFE OP 



nuns had died of ill treatment. These reports 
repeated and exaggerated, poisoned the public 
mind, and one of the Sisters laboring under an 
alienation of mind having run out of the house, 
a newspaper article charged the nuns with hav- 
ing murdered her. A clergyman whose family- 
have since been most noted in the literary 
world, especially for exciting works, fanned the 
flame by delivering no less then three anti-po- 
pery sermons in one day, and one of the select- 
men of Charlestown, after officially visiting the 
convent with others, withheld the report, which 
would have defeated the plan of the conspirators. 
Accordingly on the 11th of August, 1834, a 
mob proceeded to the convent, accompanied by 
the selectmen. Tar barrels were lighted as 
signals, no police were present, the crowd in- 
creased, shouts were uttered, accompanied with 
the most horrid blasphemies and imprecations. 
The Superior in vain endeavored to calm them, 
the doors and windows were soon broken in by 
stones and other missiles, and the mob rushing 
in began the work of destruction. The nuns 
and their pupils fled, having barely time to 
dress, and leaving all at the mercy of the citi- 
zens of enlightened New England ! In a few 
moments all was in a blaze, the valuables and 
money were carried ofiF; the chapel violated, the 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 241 



vestments torn to shreds, the Bible burnt in 
mockery, the plate carried off, and one wretch 
taking the sacred species from the tabernacle, 
went ofif vomiting his blasphemous boasts till 
struck with the divine vengeance he became 
suddenly a maniac, and seemed a victim to de- 
vouring flames. To escape the agony he suf- 
fered, he seized a razor and cut his throat from 
ear to ear. The plunder of the convent did 
not however satisfy the ruffians, they broke 
open the tomb of the deceased nunS; and finding 
nothing; left the uncoffined bodies exposed! 

The rioters were tried and acquitted. 

As soon as quiet was restored, the Ursulines, 
who had taken refuge with the Sisters of Cha- 
rity, retired to Brinley Place, Roxbury, where 
they resumed their community life. One of the 
devoted nuns, Sister St. Henry (Catherine 
Quirk), whose life was ebbing slowly away, her 
feeble health having been ruined by her ex- 
posure on that fearful night, could not bear to 
be separated from her Sisters, and she was ac- 
tually borne in their arms to her new home. 
Thence it was her consolation to turn her eyes 
towards Mount Benedict, that happy abode of 
her choice, and on the 18th of October, 1834, 
this angelic neice of Mary, Catherine and Mar- 

21 



242 LIFE OF 



garet Ryan, calmly expired, praying for the de- 
luded men who had caused her death.* 

To justify the whole transaction^ a committee; 
whom shame induced to conceal their names, 
but among whom Beecher and Kneeland, since 
synonyms for fanaticism, were the master spirits* 
published a work entitled '^ Six Months in a 
Convent/' and purporting to have been written 
by Miss Reed. Its errors and ignorance were 
exposed by the Superior of the Ursulines in an 
able answer, and two Protestant writers in the 
burlesques '' Six Months in a House of Correc- 
tion,'' and " The Chronicles of Mount Bene- 
dict/' cast such ridicule on the committee, that 
in self-defence they issued a supplement, a 
strange medley of misquoted statistics and 
frenzied ignorance.f 

* Mother St. Henry (Catherine QuirkJ was a niece of 
the holy foundresses, and her mother and two of her sis- 
ters are now members of the Ursuline community of 
Sligo, and it is to her venerable mother that I am in- 
debted for most of the above details, which I could pro- 
long, did space permit me to yield to the emotion they 
have excited. — Mother St. Henry was born May 7th, 1815. 

f For the accounts of the destruction of the convent, see 
Bishop England's Works, v. 232, 347. The other publi- 
cations are Six Months in a Convent. — Supplement to Six 
Months in a Convent, confirming the narrative of Rebecca 
Theresa Reed. Boston : Russel, Odiorne & Co., 1835. — 
Six Months in a House of Correction, or the Narrative of 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 243 



After a short time the community retired to 
Quebec, and having made a fruitless attempt to 
restore their house, in 1838* dispersed in dif- 
ferent houses of their rule : and some still sur- 
vive at Three Rivers, New Orleans, and San 
Antonio. 



CHAPTER IIL 



Other Ursuline Convents in the United States^ 
and their origin — The Convent of Brown 
Counts/, Ohio — The Convent of Cleveland — 
The Convent in St, Louis — The Convent in 
Morrissania — The Convent at Sault St. 
Mary^s. 

The most penetrating eye cannot discern the 
designs of Divine Providence, or the influence 
of ordinary events upon the destiny of indi- 
viduals and of religious society in general. In 
August, 1839, Archbishop, then Bishop Purcell, 
of Cincinnati, passing through England on his 
way to Rome, kindly took charge of two young 

Dorah Mahonej. Boston: Mussey, 1835. — The Chronicles 
of Mount Benedict. Boston: 1835. 

* They left Quebec, September 17th, 1838. 



244 LIFE OP 



ladies going from London to the UrsulinG Con- 
vent at Boulogne-sur-mer, Trance. This cir- 
cumstance, simple as it may appear in itself, 
eventually gave to the State of Ohio a Bishop, 
formerly chaplain of that community, nine or 
ten missionaries from the city and its vicinity, 
and three communities of Ursulines, in whose 
foundation the house at Boulogne took a zealous 
and active part. 

This monastery owes its origin to the zeal 
and piety of Francis du Wicquet, Sieur de 
Dringhen, who in 1624 resolved to found an 
Ursuline Convent there, and being encouraged 
byjiis Bishop Mgr. Dormy, obtained some re- 
ligious of St. Ursula from the house at Amiens. 
On the 1st of July, 1624, Mothers St. Augus- 
tine, St. Josse and Mother of the Holy Trinity, 
burning with zeal for the salvation of souls, 
left their convent and proceeded to Boulogne, 
which they reached on the eleventh. On the 
30th of September seven postulants joined 
them, and of the number one was Madamoiselle 
du Wicquet, the daughter of the pious founder. 
The regularity of the convent, the edifying 
life of the religious, and of their pupils, in whom 
all Christian graces seemed so successfully im- 
planted and nurtured, surrounded this house 
»with the love of the people, till that fearful 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 245 



hour, when God determined to try his cherished 
spouses in France in the crucible of adversity. 
The thunder clouds which hovered over the 
land burst in their fury, and the asylums of in- 
nocence were first devastated by the revolu- 
tionary storm. On the 29th of September, 
1793, twenty of the Ursulines of Boulogne, with 
some Annonciades, were led to Abbeville and 
confined like criminals by their brutal jailors : 
their convent was demolished^ and religion 
seemed crushed. 

When the first fury of the storm was spent, 
such of the Ursulines as survived, returned to 
Boulogne and its neighborhood, and in private 
families devoted themselves to teaching and 
other good works. Mother St. Maxime, as- 
sisted by two Sisters, opened schools in Bou- 
logne, and in April, 1810, became the restorer 
and first superioress of the community of Ursu- 
lines of Boulogne. Several of the old Sisters 
joined her, and many postulants applied for ad- 
mission, among the first the present Mother Su- 
perior of the house.^ 

Such was the convent which Bishop Purcell 
visited ; he was cordially welcomed to Bou- 
logne by the Abbe Amede Rappe, the chaplain 
of the Ursulines, who touched by the good 
* Letter of Mother Mary of the Annunciation. 

21^ 



246 LIFE OP 



Bishop's picture of the wants of his diocese, re- 
solved two years after to proceed to Ohio. He 
had not been long on that laborious mission, 
when he resolved to obtain, if possible, a colony 
of the Ursulines of Boulogne, who he knew had, 
from the time of his departure, projected such a 
foundation. That house was, however, unable 
to furnish sufficient members, and his plan 
seemed hopeless, when the Ursulines of Beau- 
lieu Careze, hearing that the Bishop of Cincin- 
nati was desirous of having a community of 
their order, and wishing themselves to send a 
filiation to the United States, offered to part 
with four choir and four lay sisters for the good 
work. As none of these good religious spoke 
English, they applied to the convent of Bou- 
logne-sur-mer, who gave them one professed 
choir sister, one novice and one postulant. 
The little colony from Beaulieu, consisting of 
Sister St. Pierre (Marie Andiat); Sister St. 
Stanislaus (Pauline Laurier), Sister St. Augus- 
tine (Marie Bouret), Sister St. Angele (Adeline 
Demotat), choir sisters, and Sister St. Martial, 
Sister St. Bernard, Sister St. Marie and Sister 
St. Christine, lay sisters, proceeded to Havre 
in April, 1845, and awaited the arrival of the 
Sisters from Boulogne. These soon appeared, 
consisting of Sister Julia of the Assumption 



SAIXT ANGELA MERICI. 247 



(Julia Ghatfield), professed, and Miss Matilda 
Dunn, a postulant, both natives of England, 
and Sister St. Plyacinth (Caroline Eiffe), a no- 
vice of Irish birth. 

After a delay of only three dayS; this holy 
company left Havre on the 4th of May, 1845, 
under the protection of the Rev. P. Mache- 
boeuf, and reached the port of New York on 
the 3d of June. Proceeding to Cincinnati they 
were cheerfully welcomed by the Bishop, and 
after spending a month in the house of a chari- 
table Catholic lady, took possession of the Con- 
vent of St. Martinis-, near Fayetteville, a small 
brick building, which had previously been a 
theological seminary^ Mother Julia of the As- 
sumption being the first Superior. Two years 
after, they erected their present commodious 
house, and have maintained the most exem- 
plary discipline, and follow in all its strictness 
the rule of tho Congregation of Paris. Few 
houses have been more prosperous : their actual 
number being forty-seven."^ 

Two years after the foundation of this house, 
the Rev. Amedeus Eappe was appointed Bishop 
of Cleveland, and shortly after his consecration 
proceeded to Europe to seek aid for his diocese. 
Cherishing tho hope of procuring a colony of 
* Letter of Motlier Julia of the Assumption. 



248 LIFE OP 



the Ursulines of Boulogne^ he directed his first 
steps to that house, and seconded by the Supe- 
rioress, Mother St. Ursula, succeeded in his de- 
sire. On the 16th of July, 1849^ three choir 
nuns. Mother Mary of the Incarnation, Superi- 
oress, Sister St. Charles and Sister des Sera- 
phins, accompanied by a lay sister, and a young 
English lady, a convert, whom the Bishop had 
received into the Church when chaplain of the 
house, bade adieu to their community and all 
its holy associations, and three days after em- 
barked at Havre with Bishop Rappe. On the 
8th of August they reached Cleveland, and were 
at once conducted to the residence which the 
Yicar-General, the Very Rev. Louis de Goes- 
briand, had prepared for their reception. On 
the festival of the Nativity of the Blessed Vir- 
gin their schools were opened, and on the 15th 
of October the Bishop proposed three candidates 
for the novitiate, one of them the convert al- 
ready mentioned, whO; on the 28th of December, 
1852, became the first professed. The number 
of religious and pupils has increased so rapidly, 
that they have already been twice compelled to 
enlarge the monastery. It now contains sixteen 
professed choir sisters, seven novices^ two pos- 
tulants, and nine lay sisters. They direct in 
Cleveland a boarding school, four day schools. 



SAINT ANGELA MERICI. 249 



and four free schools containing about five hun- 
dred children. For much of the goocf which 
they have been enabled to do, the Ursulines 
ascribe the credit to the zeal and interest which 
the excellent Bishop and his clergy have ever 
shown in their welfare. 

Notwithstanding many obstacles, the Ursu- 
lines of Cleveland were enabled to send a colony 
to Toledo in December, 1854, consisting of six 
religious, who thus founded the tenth Ursuline 
Convent in the United States. Sister des Sera- 
phins being the Superioress. In Toledo they 
have charge of two day schools and two free 
schools, attended by a great number of child- 
ren.*^ 

Divine Providence was pleased to commence 
the foundation of another Ursuline Convent at 
St. Louis, Missouri, the seventh house of the 
order, through the efforts and zeal of the Very 
Eev. Joseph Melcher, V. G-., who set out from 
St. Louis in 1846 for Europe. On a visit at 
an Ursuline Convent in Oedensburg, in Hun- 
gary, he obtained three members of that com- 
munity to found a house at St. Louis, to pro- 
mote the education of female youth. Animated 
with the spirit of their holy order, these three, 
Mother Magdalen Stehlin, Mother Mary Ann 
* Letter of Motlier Mary of tlie Annunciation. 



250 LIFE OF 



Pan, and Mother Augustine Schragel, left tlieir 
convent for America on the 13th of March, 
1847. Compelled by circumstances to stop at 
several convents on their way, they did not 
reach St. Louis till the 5th of September, 1848. 
Here a small house had been procured by the 
exertions of their founder and director, and the 
community organized by electing Mother Stehlin 
as Superior. Their day school was opened in 
November, and was speedily filled. 

On the 25th of May, 1849, six nuns, invited 
by the Ursulines of St. Louis, arrived from the 
Convent of Landshut, in Bavaria, four being 
choir nuns, and two lay sisters. 

In the following year a new building was 
erected out of the city, in a pleasant and healthy 
situation, and the community removed to it on 
the 13th of November. Their academy now 
contains about forty boarders, and sixty day 
scholars. The community under Mother Aloy- 
sia Winkler, a religious of Landshut, comprises 
eleven professed nuns and ten novices. 

On the 16th of May, 1855, the Superior, 
Mother Magdalen Stehlin, repaired, with ten 
members of her community, to East Morrisania, 
near New York, and founded a new Ursuline 
Convent within a few miles of the spot where 
the Irish Ursulines oflTered up their prayers and 
good works nearly fifty years before. 



SAINT ANGELA MEEICI. 251 



The convent at Sault St. Mary^s, in Upper 
Michigan, that still frontier post where the Je- 
suit missionaries planted the cross two centu- 
ries ago, was founded in 1853. On the 3d of 
March in that year, Mother Mary Xavier 
(Yvonna Le Bihon), with a little colony, left 
the convent of Faouet, in Brittany, to found a 
house of their holy order on the banks of Lake 
Superior. They were first installed in a small 
building opposite the modest Cathedral, where, 
in spite of their narrow accommodations, and 
their poverty, several young ladies of distin- 
guished talents renounced the world to join 
them. They now occupy a more convenient 
monastery, which the Et. Rev. Frederic Baraga, 
the Bishop of the See, enlarged last spring. 



THE END. 



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